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The First American 

and other 

Sunday Evening Studies 



m 



Biography 



By CHARLES J. BALDWIN, D. D. 



Published by the First Baptist Church of Granville, Ohio, in 
Recognition of Twenty-five Years of Service by the Author as 
Pastor of the Church. 



GRANVILLE, OHIO 
1911 






COPYRIGHT, 1911 

BY 

CHARLES J. BALDWIN 
Published December, 1911 



©CI.A303372 



THE CHAMPLIN PRESS 
COLUMBUS, OHIO 




"T^^sc^ ^^Clrt.-xX^ P^L,*^ Ax:<.4y^t- ^-*-*y>\ ^^-^<^<»*/^ 



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Contents 



PAGE 

I. The First American 5 

II. The Real Washington 37 

III. Jonathan Edwards and Benjamin Franklin. . 57 

IV. Thomas Paine 81 

V. Benedict Arnold 103 

VI. Aaron Burr and Alexander Hamilton 1 29 

VII. Ulysses S. Grant 153 

VIII. Savonarola 177 

IX. Joan of Arc 201 

X. John Wiclif 225 

XI. Luther and Erasmus 245 

XII. John Knox and Mary Queen of Scots 269 




ABRAHAM LINCOLN 



The First American 



I 



N his "Commemoration Ode" Lowell 
speaks of Abraham Lincoln as 

" The kindly-earnest, brave, foreseeing 

man — 
Sagacious, patient, dreading praise, not 

blame- 
New birth of our new soil, the first 

American. 



But does not this ascribed pre-eminence conflict 
with the well-known epithet which crowns George 
Washingt©n as "first in war, first in peace, first in the 
hearts of his countrymen?" 

N»: — In the sense intended by the poet, it is 
true that, as a new birth of the new soil of this 
Republic, Lincoln was its most typical production. 
He was "the first American" as embodying most 
fully the peculiar elements of the new nation of the 
western world. 

For it should be remembered that Washington 
was not an American in the modern sense of the 
term. He belonged to the Colonial period, and was 



6 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

the consummate flower of a time and a condition of 
things which do not belong to our era. Sprung from 
an ancient English stock — a descendant of the Cav- 
aliers and inheriting their aristocratic blood, the Vir- 
ginia gentleman was from first to last of the patrician 
order. His youth was nurtured under the shadow 
of reverent loyalty to the crown. Until near mid- 
dle life he had never heard the word "Independence" 
applied to political ideas. The few books that he 
read, all of the tuition he received, the religion 
which he practiced, were imported from England. 
In common with his class, he would have shrunk 
with dread from the suggestion of a republican form 
of government. Thus he grew up in the wild west- 
ern forests — an oak sapling transplanted from the 
gardens of Albion. And to the end of his life he 
remained — in the stateliness of his manner, the punc- 
tilio of his deportment, and the elegance of his dress 
— a realization of the European ideal of a gentle- 
man. 

It is difficult for us to reproduce that figure which 
was toward the close of the last century the pride 
of the young Republic: — tall and dignified, with 
powdered hair, clad in black velvet edged with cost- 
ly lace, with yellow gloves, and silver shoe buckles 
and a white scabbard sword at side, and a cocked 



THE FIRST AMERICAN 7 

hat plumed on the head, the Father of his Country 
was evidently not a man of the 1 9th century. And 
as he rode abroad in state as President — in a cream 
colored carriage, drawn by six white horses, and at- 
tended by servants in livery of white trimmed with 
green — he was in all respects a contrast to that 
gaunt ungainly man, clad in ill-fitting garments of 
plebeian type, who arrived in Washington by stealth 
in a sleeping car on the morning of Feb. 25, 1861, 
as the President-elect of the United States. 

Between the splendid statuesque form of the one, 
and the common, even coarse, appearance of the oth- 
er, there was apparently but little in common. They 
were in fact representatives of two widely different 
epochs of our national history. But of the two it 
is certain that Lincoln was the more truly an Amer- 
ican. He owed nothing to the old world. By 
birth and breeding he was a child of the west. Even 
the eccentricities which marred his character and the 
roughness of his style at times, showed the soil from 
which he sprang — the rude, unsightly, but firm, 
strong and fruitful elements of America. And when 
we consider the environments of the two personages, 
and the vastly variant nature of the work given them 
to do, we may be grateful that neither of them was 
put in the other's place. 



8 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

Washington was perfectly adapted to his world 
— that small and poor provincial sphere, with its 
thirteen little colonies scattered along the coast, and 
containing a population all told hardly larger than 
the city of New York now contains — when there 
was nothing west of the Allegheny mountains but a 
howling wilderness; when along the difficult roads 
a laboring coach struggled three times a week from 
New York to Philadelphia at the rate of four or five 
miles an hour; when there were but nine colleges, 
two hospitals, fifteen newspapers, and no public li- 
braries, nor any free schools in the land; when the 
people were in the infant stage of political and in- 
tellectual progress, needing leaders and directors, 
and ready to submit to any wise authority — then was 
the time for such a magisterial man, such a paternal 
power as that of Washington, with all of the acces- 
sories of rank, culture and wealth, to become the 
centralizing head — the crystalizing focus of a new 
nation. 

But a very different kind of endowment was need- 
ed for the Chief Magistrate who confronted the na- 
tional crisis of 1861. What an unspeakable differ- 
ence between the nation of that day and one century 
before! — a vast empire stretching from ocean to 
ocean — the intervening space filled with states and 



THE FIRST AMERICAN 9 

territories teeming with people drawn from all parts 
of the world — the land covered with a network of 
canals, railroads, and telegraph wires — all of the 
arts and industries flourishing — manufactures and 
commerce, education and religion everywhere and 
eminent, — such was the sphere that called Abraham 
Lincoln to its leadership. But the other side of the 
picture! — instead of a few colonies struggling to- 
ward union, a great federation threatened with dis- 
union! — instead of a foreign power asserting its au- 
thority, an intestine element claiming for itself su- 
premacy ! — in place of an invasion from without, an 
insurrection from within! — in place of Liberty as 
the ideal and motive. Slavery as the secret if un- 
avowed impulse! Such was the emergency that 
Lincoln must confront. 

And for this issue he, not Washington, was the 
man. The time had long gone by when the aris- 
tocratic elements of the old regime could fitly hold 
the reins of the young Republic. The day of the 
Federalists, of whom Washington was the ideal and 
Hamilton was the advocate, came to an end with 
the administrations of Madison, Monroe and Adams. 
With them the "gentleman in politics" stepped down 
and out, and with Jackson the reign of the common 
people began. This was the Jeffersonian ideal, and 



10 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

with all of its rudeness and violence, its blunders and 
failures, the new regime was more strictly true to the 
American type than its predecessor. It brought the 
politician to the front, the spoils system and the ma- 
chine; but it also lifted the commonalty to the na- 
tional plane. The new race — heterogeneous and 
ill equipped, but full of the potentialities of a bound- 
less future — the farmer, the workman, the pioneer, 
the settler — these plebeian elements thenceforth ruled 
the land. And of this new era, rough but strong, 
unmannerly but mighty with the untrained forces of 
the western world, Abraham Lincoln was the best 
exponent. 

His derivation was significant. He came from 
the yeoman class, — sons of the soil whose genera- 
tions had never known the graces of culture and rank. 
The family stock was transplanted from England to 
Massachusetts in 1638; moved next from Massachu- 
setts to Pennsylvania; then from Pennsylvania to 
Virginia; next from Virginia to Kentucky where 
Abraham Lincoln was born in 1809; then from 
Kentucky to Indiana where he lived until eight years 
old; finally from Indiana to Illinois, of which state 
he was a citizen after the age of twenty-one. Such 
was his ancestry — a long series of hard-working, 
intelligent, upright men and women, who had forced 



THE FIRST AMERICAN 11 

their way westward, with toil and trouble, but in- 
domitable and overcoming energy. And this per- 
severing, progressive tendency was typical of the 
American people at large; always on the move to- 
ward the more and better ; never satisfied, ever aspir- 
ing and advancing. It was the stored up traditional 
force of this energy of five generations that made 
Lincoln the Moses of the new Exodus. 

And so he stands before us on the frontier, amidst 
the stumps and brushwood of the clearings, where 
the log houses invade the primeval forests with 
omens of a great change in the order of nature, — a 
tall gaunt figure, six feet four inches in height, with 
sallow face and bushy hair and keen gray eyes. 

Not a trace of cultivation in dress or deportment. 
Clad in the coarse homespun of the backwoods — 
utterly careless of appearance, he is an average man 
of his class. But a leader also from the first; a 
champion in athletics, stronger with the axe and 
spade than any of his fellows, foremost in all sports, 
indomitable and unconquerable; also a social char- 
acter — witty, full of stories, the pride of the village 
store, where his endless fund of anecdotes and his 
shrewd maxims made him a Socrates of the fron- 
tier, a Franklin of the woods; also a growing in- 
tellect; — with but one year of schooling after the 



12 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

age of ten, he was yet always reading, pondering, 
exploring. He mastered arithmetic and geometry 
after a fashion of his own, absorbed Burns' poems 
and was familiar with Shakespeare ; his darling book 
was Weems' Life of Washington, which mendacious 
but fascinating story was at one time his companion 
by night and day. He had purchased a copy of it by 
three days' work in the woods. Also he was from 
the first of a profoundly moral nature ; the conscience 
was his strongest attribute; a sense of right and 
wrong his keenest perception. No one ever lived 
who had a more intense natural love for abstract 
justice. This he inherited from his step-mother — a 
woman of great mental and moral power, of whom 
he said, "all that I am or hope to be I owe to my 
mother." He was known far and wide as a young 
man who never used tobacco, or drank liquor, or 
gambled, or swore, but the best worker, wrestler, 
fighter, story-teller in the region, and incorruptible 
in all things, such as the payment of debts and the 
use of money. "Honest Abe Lincoln" became his 
popular soubriquet. But can we wonder at this 
when we learn from his intimate friend Arnold that 
Lincoln knew the Bible from end to end, more 
thoroughly than many ministers of the Gospel ? And 



THE FIRST AMERICAN 13 

it was from that source he drew the inspiration for 
his lofty ideals of duty and absolute righteousness. 

He never became a church member or professed 
what we call regeneration; but he had a religion of 
his own which embraced the doctrines of God, the 
immortality of the soul, the authority of the Bible, 
the duty of prayer and the cultivation of practical 
righteousness. His public life abounds in illustra- 
tions of his belief in Divine Providence and his own 
dependence on Divine help; but he seems to have 
shared with Franklin an aversion to the formalities 
of creed and Christian profession. 

TTius we see the first American growing up in the 
backwoods, with few of the helps of civilization but 
with the higher assistance of self-reliance and Divine 
impulse. When in after years he astonished the 
scholars of Boston with the classic simplicity of his 
style and the logical energy of his thought, he ac- 
counted for it to one who inquired for the reason, by 
saying that perhaps he had acquired it through the 
habit of thinking out for himself the problems of 
mathematics and putting truthful thoughts into the 
most exact language that he could find. 

But there was always a mystery about Abraham 
Lincoln. His most intimate friends never under- 
stood him fully. There was so much of contrariety 



14 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

about him. His nature was paradoxical. On one 
side he seemed to be a jovial hearty person delighting 
in humor and good fellowship. And this was car- 
ried to extremes at times. There is no need of dei- 
fying him, as some have done, or of ignoring the 
coarse fibre which spoke of his low extraction. Un- 
deniably he was offensive to some of refined taste, 
with his ill-timed jests and inveterate story telling. 
The President of the United States who could open 
an important Cabinet meeting, where the most ser- 
ious matters were to be decided, by reading a chap- 
ter from Artemus Ward and delighting in its buf- 
foonery, could not have had a perfectly well-bal- 
anced nature. But it must be remembered that his 
levity was only occasional and that his humor was 
but incidental. A familiar friend has declared that 
Abraham Lincoln rarely told a joke or even a good 
story for its own sake, for mere amusement. It was 
always to illustrate a truth or point an argument. 
The motive was often serious and the aim lofty. He 
himself said that his jocularity was merely a means 
of relief to him from the prevailing sadness of his 
thought. To one who remonstrated with him for 
his story-telling at momentous crises he said, "Were 
it not for this occasional vent I should die." Who 
indeed could begrudge to that sore-tried and heavy 



THE FIRST AMERICAN 15 

laden soul a pleasantry now and then, even though 
it were not always as delicate as Irving, Holmes or 
Lowell might prefer? 

But on the other hand, he was capable of the most 
opposite experiences. He was often of a melan- 
choly mood that saddened his days. As easily de- 
pressed as elevated, he was capable of the most in- 
tense suffering. This sensitiveness of temperament 
was aggravated by personal sorrow and domestic in- 
felicity in his early life ; and it gave to him that weary 
haggard look which, as President, he wore through 
the dark times of the national agony. 

He had not the magnificent equipoise of Washing- 
ton, his cultivated repose and self-command. Lin- 
coln had a feminine soul, of acute susceptibility to 
joy and sorrow; and perhaps this was necessary to 
his great work of sympathy for the oppressed. Also 
he was both a realist and an idealist. Of the most 
practical bent, by nature and expression, he ignored 
all abstractions and speculations. He would have 
nothing to do with philosophy as such, in law or in 
religion. 

And yet there was a vein of dreamy idealism in 
his nature, which showed itself in his fondness for 
poetry (of a tender sentimental kind, such as Burns, 
his favorite.) He believed in omens and dreams to 



16 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

the verge of superstition. He was always a man of 
intuitions and premonitory signs. In his youth he 
firmly believed and often said that he was destined 
to be the President of the nation ; and during his life 
at Washington, he frequently affirmed that he was 
sure he would come to some sad end. The night 
before his death he had a dream of warning. All 
this is not to us a psychological mystery, for we rec- 
ognize the signs of that peculiar organization which 
is frequently given to men to whom a great mission 
is entrusted. They have a nature open toward the 
spiritual sphere, and their visionary tendencies are 
the means of Divine inspiration. This endowment 
makes of one, a Hebrew prophet; of another, a 
Grecian seer; of another, a soldier like Cromwell, 
a preacher like Edwards. If unaccompanied by 
practical efficiency, this strange gift results in mere 
mysticism; but when, as in Lincoln's case, it is con- 
ditioned by positive qualities, it becomes a connecting 
link between the supernatural world and this. 

And so it came to pass that this plain backwoods- 
man was always ahead of and above his fellow men. 
There was something in him that they could not 
understand or meet. When suddenly elevated (by 
a most unlocked for nomination and almost miracu- 
lous election) to the leadership of the nation, the 



THE FIRST AMERICAN 17 

veteran party leaders thought that they would have 
no difficulty in managing this raw recruit from the 
prairies. But they soon found themselves mistaken. 
Thurlow Weed, an astute politician who was accus- 
tomed to rule everyone, confessed after an interview 
with the new candidate, that he was the first man he 
had ever met who was too much for him. Seward 
also, and Chase and Cameron and Blair, the mem- 
bers of his Cabinet, expected as a matter of course 
that they would have their way in the Government 
councils over this inexperienced man of the West; 
but at the very first meeting he quietly took command, 
reduced them to subordination, and never afterward 
yielded his supremacy. 

So when the delegations of bankers and mer- 
chants and citizens called on him with their appeals 
or demands or protests, he always treated them with 
the easy grace of natural superiority. Assuming no 
forced dignity or arbitrary authority, he was still 
above and aloof from them in the calm consciousness 
of a higher power. It seemed to be as natural for 
him to be Commander-in-Chief of the Army and 
Navy, as it had been to run a little law office in 
Springfield. And although uncouth in manner and 
careless in his appearance, he could at times assume 
the statehness of a decorum well befitting his position. 



18 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

But we cannot follow him through the consecu- 
tive stages of his romantic career, the story of which 
is one of the most adventurous and impressive chap- 
ters of American history. Our study of his char- 
acter can be conducted best by observing him in the 
light of three great contrasts. We may compare 
him with Stephen Douglas, Charles Sumner, and 
Jefferson Davis, with each of whom he came in con- 
tact officially. 

In the first instance, we see Lincoln as a pioneer 
politician and reformer. He had drifted into the 
legal profession, by following the bent of his own 
nature, which inclined easily in that direction. He 
had a logical mind, of keen analysis and ready pow- 
er of debate. Always delighting in argument and 
gifted with a persuasive skill, he needed no forensic 
schooling to render him an effective pleader. No 
technical training or diploma of the schools was re- 
quired in those primitive settlements, so that the 
young lawyer soon found himself in practice. 

But he had one trait peculiar to himself. He was 
firmly devoted to the abstract right in everything. 
He would accept no case of the justice of which he 
was not convinced. He could even abandon a 
cause when he found it was no longer defensible 
morally. Nor was he ever at his best as an advo- 



THE FIRST AMERICAN 19 

cate, save when some principle of righteousness was 
at stake ; then he seemed to rise into an impassioned 
power that was always irresistible. 

As a lawyer he soon became identified with local 
politics; and since the great slavery agitation was 
then convulsing the land, he was drawn into the 
irrepressible conflict. His reputation as a party 
leader soon brought him into prominence in the 
State contests, and he became the champion of those 
who were already beginning to carry the old Whig 
principles to the new Republican platform. This 
brought him into collision with Stephen A. Douglas, 
who was the leader of the party of compromise in 
the West. These two men appeared before the 
public in a series of debates, in 1 854-8, the fame of 
which spread throughout the Union. 

They presented a contrast of the most impressive 
character. Douglas was a great popular favorite, 
and deservedly so. Short and full in person — of 
broad, vigorous frame, handsome face and bold 
spirited manner, the Little Giant was the best stump 
speaker of his day. He was master of all the arts 
of debate — adroit in oratorical methods, and of a 
magnetic personality. As a politician he was clev- 
er, unscrupulous, ready to buy success at any cost. 



20 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

Lincoln was no match for such a man in the or- 
dinary management of a campaign. Slow and ser- 
ious in his style of speaking — conscientious in his 
treatment of topics, and unwilling to stoop to any 
compromise of principle — he was at a disadvantage 
with the crowd. But when it came to dealing with 
such a great national issue as Freedom or Slavery, 
the result was different. Then Douglas showed his 
weakness; for he was a man of expediency. Caring 
nothing at all for moral principles, and looking at 
the crisis from a party point of view, he was dis- 
tinctly below the level of the occasion. Lincoln, 
on the other hand, was in his element. His native 
passion for justice — his keen perception of abstract 
right and wrong — his deep and tender sympathy for 
human suffering, all these attributes were developed 
by the great question of the hour. They made of 
him a Prophet, an Apostle of the Truth. Rising 
above all technicalities of legislative law, he grasped 
the central ideas of the American Constitution, and 
with as keen a logic and as mighty a force as Web- 
ster, he argued the case of Freedom against Slavery 
with a power which Webster never wielded so well 
— that of Conscience and the Moral Law. 

Those who heard him — out on the prairies, under 
the dome of heaven, in the midst of a vast multitude 



THE FIRST AMERICAN 21 

of hushed and intent auditors — heard Demosthenes 
against PhiHp, and Edmund Burke against Hast- 
ings, or Patrick Henry against the British Crown. 
For oratory never reaches its acme until it becomes 
the voice of the right pleading against the wrong. 
But the secret of his wonderful success as a popular 
speaker lay in his religious convictions. As he 
told a friend, "Douglas don't care whether slavery 
is voted up or down; but God cares, and humanity 
cares, and I care; and with God's help I shall not 
fail. The future would be something awful, as I 
look at it, but for this rock on which I stand," (hold- 
ing up a Bible as he spoke.) 

This leads us to another of the contrasts which 
illustrate the character of Abraham Lincoln — his 
association with Charles Sumner. Therein we see 
him as a conslriictive statesman. When he assumed 
command of the Ship of State at Washington, he 
was at once confronted by men who were the very 
antipodes of Douglas. They were the champions 
of the great battle in the East which had precipitated 
the crisis of Secession. Charles Sumner was the 
representative in Congress of such men as Garrison, 
Phillips, and Greely — the redoubtable abolitionists 
who had forced the nation to address itself to the 
righting of a great wrong. When, therefore, the 



22 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

new President, who stood for the triumph of those 
principles, entered upon his duties, they naturally 
supposed that he would follow their policy. This 
was one of direct and extreme treatment of slavery. 
Garrison and Phillips had been, avowedly, disun- 
ionists before the outbreak — willing to let the South 
go in order to get rid of its curse at any cost. But 
the least that they could accept was that the govern- 
ment should at once abolish slavery by law, and de- 
clare the immediate emancipation of all the bonds- 
men. This was the program submitted to Mr. Lin- 
coln by the radical reformers, as their demand and 
his duty. 

But he refused it. He told them that his first 
duty was to assert and maintain the integrity of the 
Union. Against the prayers and protests of the 
extreme radicals, in spite of their complaints and in 
some cases their abuse, he for more than a year 
refused to use his power to abolish slavery. He ne- 
gatived the action of Fremont and Hunter in freeing 
the slaves. He forbade the army to be used for 
such a purpose. It was the preservation of the Un- 
ion which he made the war cry of the hour. Yet 
all the time he was studying the problem profoundly. 

Lincoln knew the South better than the North 
knew it; and he knew the North better than the 



THE FIRST AMERICAN 23 

South did. He knew that beneath the brag and 
bluster of the fire-eaters were, as afterward showed, 
the splendid valor, the romantic sacrifice, the con- 
summate ability which made of the Lost Cause in 
some respects the admiration of the world. And 
he also knew that behind the money and mechanics 
of the North were the high-minded ideal, the deep- 
hearted enthusiasm, the indomitable temper and the 
inexhaustible resources of what proved to be the 
conquering cause. Knowing all this and feeling 
what an awful thing a conflict between the two sec- 
tions would be, he stood between the two with per- 
sistent effort to compose their strife. But when he 
saw that this result could not be reached, he stripped 
for the fray; and before the Southern leaders were 
through with him they found out what he was, — a 
tough specimen of that grim old pioneer breed' — 
men who had fought the battles of the wilderness 
and wrestled with the forces of nature and learned 
how to take hold and not let go. At first inclined 
to a process of gradual and compensated emancipa- 
tion, he became convinced of its futility; and then 
biding his time, he waited for the due occasion for 
more extreme measures. This came after the battle 
of Antietam; and then the nation and the world 
were electrified with the Proclamation of Emanci- 



24 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

pation, on January 1 , 1 863, by which the shackles 
were finally and forever broken from the American 
slave. 

Now consider this picture of Lincoln as a Re- 
former. Suppose that he had adopted the advice 
of Charles Sumner and begun his administration with 
the Proclamation of Emancipation. It is historical- 
ly certain that the North would have been paralyzed 
and Secession would have triumphed. For public 
opinion was not yet ready for the abolition of slavery. 
Democrats and Republicans would never have har- 
monized on that issue. There could have been no 
such general uprising, no such universal enlistment 
as at once gave to the North an army. This Lin- 
coln saw with the instinct of a true statesman. He 
felt that the only appeal which could unify the 
North and enable it to overcome the Solid South 
was the battle cry of Webster, "The Union must 
be preserved!" And the result approved his wis- 
dom. 

We tremble now to think of what would have 
happened if Sumner had been in Lincoln's place. 
Without a doubt the Union would have perished 
and slavery been forever established on American 
soil. For we can now see the supreme wisdom of 
the President's decision. By waiting for the course 



THE FIRST AMERICAN 25 

of events to provide an opportunity, he let public 
opinion educate itself: so that when the time came, 
every one (North and South alike) admitted that as 
a war measure Emancipation was justifiable and nec- 
essary. Of course our government had as much 
right to free the negroes as to seize any other property 
of the enemy. 

And thus Lincoln showed that he was a construc- 
tive statesman. He knew what so many reformers 
seem not to know, — that it is needful not only to do 
the right thing, but to do it in the right way and at 
the right time. He had that rare blending of oppo- 
site qualities which fitted him to be the master of all 
occasions. In his debates with Douglas he showed 
himself a Radical, fearless and unsparing. In his 
dealing with Sumner he was a Conservative, calm, 
cautious and patient. At both times he was exactly 
true to the duty of the hour. But whence came 
such a union of courage and caution, readiness and 
patience, swiftness and slowness to this inexperienced 
unlettered man? Listen to these words spoken by 
him to a friend shortly before his election : 'T know 
there is a God, and He hates injustice and slavery. 
I see the storm coming. I know that His hand is 
in it. If He has a place and work for me — and I 
think He has — I believe I am ready. I am nothing. 



26 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

but truth is everything. I know I am right because 
I know that liberty is right, for Christ teaches it and 
Christ is God." That was the secret of Lincoln's 
bold and fervid radicalism. 

But when beset by the extremists at Washington 
who were anxious for immediate results, he replied, 
"If I can learn God's will, I will do it. If it is 
probable that He would reveal His will to others, 
it may be supposed that He would reveal it to me. 
Whatever shall appear to be God's will, I will do." 
That was the secret of his conservatism, — a defer- 
ence to and dependence on Divine authority rather 
than human suggestion. 

And so these two great energies balanced each 
other and co-operated to give his life a true orbit, 
as the centrifugal and centripetal forces combine to 
keep the planets in their shining path. Has not this 
nation reason to be grateful that loyalty to the Di- 
vine Law was the principle of its great leader's life, 
at the crisis of its destiny? 

The final contrast which we will consider is that 
which presents to us Abraham Lincoln and Jefferson 
Davis. This will reveal to us the subject of our 
study as a competent ruler. It is an impressive fact 
that these two were born in the same state (Ken- 
tucky) in the same year, and within a few months 



THE FIRST AMERICAN 27 

and miles of each other, — the one a nursHng of pros- 
perity, endowed with the best of circumstantial for- 
tunes, the other a mere waif of privation and adver- 
sity. Was there ever a more striking, wonderous pic- 
ture than that which the whole world looked upon in 
the year 1 861 ? The Great Republic had fallen apart 
into two distinct nations, confronting each other with 
angry mien and hostile intent. The North and the 
South seemed as separate and antagonistic as Prussia 
and Austria in the campaign of Sadowa. In the 
character of their people, institutions and spirit, they 
appeared to be antipodal to each other. But not 
more so than the leaders whom they had respectively 
chosen as their champions. On the one hand ap- 
peared a man who had been by nature and experi- 
ence specially prepared for such a position. Jeffer- 
son Davis was the exponent of all that was finest in 
Southern history and culture. A gentleman of high 
birth and choicest education, a professional soldier, 
an experienced statesman, he was amply endowed 
with the gifts of leadership. He had served his 
country in the army and the legislature, and com- 
manded the respect of all who knew him. Person- 
ally also he was admirable, of stately presence and 
manners, accustomed to the highest society, and in 
morals irreproachable. Such was the chieftain who 



28 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

stood forth to represent and preside over the fortunes 
of the South in the great struggle. 

Opposed to him the North displayed as their cap- 
tain a man without special experience of any kind 
in the art of government, who had nothing but self- 
culture to depend upon, and was disadvantaged also 
by certain personal traits which did not commend 
him to the eyes of the critical. This was what the 
world saw; and many were the sneers and doubt- 
ings with which it regarded the contrast of the rail- 
splitter with the gentleman. But as time rolled on, 
the world began to modify its judgment. Jefferson 
Davis proved to be less qualified for his position 
than was expected: and because of his very excel- 
lences. The consciousness of his superior endow- 
ments made of him an autocrat. He thought he 
knew more about war than his generals, more about 
statecraft than his advisers. From the first he show- 
ed an imperious, self-willed spirit which became the 
cause of many mistakes. Southern writers have al- 
ways deplored his interference with the campaigns 
of such men as Johnston and Beauregard. It is 
claimed that but for this, Washington would have 
been captured after the battle of Bull Run, Vicks- 
burg need not have fallen, nor Atlanta been lost. 
The extreme partisanship of Davis is held respon- 



THE FIRST AMERICAN 29 

sible for the ill-conduct of the commissariat of the 
southern armies and the frequent employment of in- 
ferior men. For no one could advise or move Jef- 
ferson Davis. He was the Dictator of the South, 
arbitrary and unyielding, who wasted its substance 
and brought it too soon to its final failure. 

With Abraham Lincoln it was just the other way. 
Conscious of his deficiencies, he never assumed to 
be infallible or supreme. Open to suggestion and 
considerate of others, his patient, comprehensive 
mind gradually asserted its native authority and be- 
came at last the central pillar of the state. He 
made mistakes, often, but he did not repeat them. 
He always accepted advice and profited by experi- 
ence. Sometimes mortifying his friends and em- 
barrassing his subordinates by ill-timed levity or a 
certain perverseness of temper, he would rectify any 
wrong and avoid any error that was pointed out to 
him. For he was open-minded and humble-heart- 
ed: and such souls are ever growing in power and 
wisdom even through their own defects. History 
is only beginning to see what almost superhuman 
wisdom and goodness was needed to regulate all the 
conflicting elements of the North — to encourage the 
timid conservatives and restrain the fiery radicals, 
to deal firmly with disloyalty while rewarding fidel- 



30 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

ity. We look with amazement on the skill with 
which he held together in one cabinet such antagon- 
istic spirits as the irascible Stanton, the cautious Se- 
ward, the dictatorial Chase, the impetuous Blair. 
With what marvelous sagacity and good temper did 
he at once support and rule his many generals — the 
much promising, never performing McClellan; the 
pedantic Halleck; the Fabian Buell; the rash Hook- 
er; the slow but sure Thomas; the brilliant Sherman; 
the late developing but all conquering Grant ! What 
could these different and often discordant warriors 
have done without the calm providence over them 
of a sympathetic but sovereign Ruler? 

Then, too, the foreign policy of the government — 
so complicated and difficult, in the face of a hostile 
world, yet so wisely conducted as to out-maneuver 
all the plots of European statesmen and compel them 
to respect the flag whose dishonor they desired. His 
management of the Trent affair alone showed him 
to be a first-class diplomatist. But no need to pur- 
sue the subject. History has already decided be- 
tween the hero of the North and the champion of 
the South; and its verdict is, that all of the experi- 
ence and accomplishments of the latter soon paled 
before the native power of the former. Indeed, I 
heard a Confederate soldier say at the close of the 



THE FIRST AMERICAN 31 

war, "If you had had Davis, and we had had Lin- 
coln, the result would have been very different." 

Perhaps the greatest claim of Abraham Lincoln 
to the admiration and affection of the people whom 
he served so well, lay in his kind-heartedness. It 
was the genuine goodness of the man — his gener- 
osity toward his enemies, his leniency toward offend- 
ers, his sympathy for the suffering, that made us love 
him so. He could not be brought to retaliate for the 
ill-treatment of our prisoners. He would pardon 
criminals against the protests of his officers. This 
touched the American heart. Edward Everett's 
classic oration at Gettysburg has faded out of mem- 
ory, but the simple words of Lincoln will live for- 
ever, — "The world will little heed nor long remem- 
ber what we say here, but can never forget what 
they did here." And when will the glory fade of 
those sublime words of his last inaugural, spoken in 
the midst of all the cost and agony and peril of a 
still undecided war — "with malice toward none, 
with charity for all, with firmness in the right as 
God gives us to see the right, let us finish the work 
we are to do." 

If now it is asked, as it should be, whence came 
to a man of such an origin, such training and such 
equipm.ent, this well-poised wisdom, this rare com- 



32 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

bination of strength and humility, courage and ten- 
derness, statesmanship and simpHcity? let the ans- 
wer be found in his own words, when leaving Spring- 
field to assume his high office at Washington in Feb- 
ruary, 1861. Standing on the platform of the car 
and looking for the last time on the familiar faces of 
the multitude who had known him from his youth, 
he said: "My friends: I now leave you, not know- 
ing whether I may return, with a task before me 
greater than that which rested upon Washington. 
Without the assistance of that Divine Being who 
ever attended him, I cannot succeed. With that 
assistance I cannot fail. To his care commending 
you, as I hope that in your prayers you will com- 
mend me, I bid you farewell." Thus Abraham 
Lincoln struck the keynote of his career as Presi- 
dent, and with these words he passed out of their 
sight, on his way to Duty, Death, and Glory. 

At the end of the month of April, 1865, I was 
serving as a staff officer under General Potter in 
South Carolina. Our division had been operating 
in the interior of the state, and was returning to the 
seaboard. A large company of contrabands were 
under our charge — colored people fleeing from home 
to the shelter of the Northern flag. Hiey were full 
of the thoughtless hopefulness and jollity of their 



THE FIRST AMERICAN 33 

race. Of the future they knew and cared nothing 
— enough for them that the Year of Jubilee had 
come, and the Lord had said to Pharaoh, let my 
people go. So, out of Egypt they were thronging, 
with their mules and carts and all their worldly 
goods packed up, ready for the land of Canaan. 
Father Abraham had called them, and they had in 
him the faith of Israel in Moses. One night — I 
shall never forget the scene — the command was en- 
camped somewhere in the pine woods by the Edisto 
river. It was a wild, wet night; the darkness hung 
heavy over the forest, and the camp fires threw their 
red light across the smoky air, over a bivouac of the 
soldiers and the rude groups of the negroes. All 
was bustle and noise — familiar to us then, after years 
of out-door life, hardships and peril; but suddenly 
a hush began to steal through the encampment. A 
strange whisper stole around from group to group, — 
"The President has been assassinated." Men stood 
still and held their breath. They stared in each 
others' faces without a word. If the Archangel's 
trump had announced the end of the world there 
would not have been a more awe-struck, bewildered 
multitude. Abraham Lincoln dead? — incredible! 
impossible ! And so through the rest of the night we 
remained silent, or spoke only in whispers. The 



34 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

freedmen had no songs by the campfire. They 
crouched terror-stricken. "What was to become of 
them? Where should they go?" When the day- 
light came we resumed the march, hoping against 
hope for some contradiction of the awful, the in- 
conceivable tidings. But it was confirmed only too 
soon and surely. And there hangs over me to this 
day the heavy gloom of the South Carolina forest, 
whenever I think of the death of Abraham Lincoln. 
I cannot shake off the nameless horror of that noctur- 
nal fright — fit emblem of the deed of darkness that 
whelmed a nation in its gloom. It was more than 
a crime — it was a national catastrophe so great as to 
defy all philosophy to measure it. 

The cruel questions which so many have asked 
in its shadow — "Why was such a life taken away 
just when it was needed most? What would have 
been the results to North and South if the wise, pat- 
ient, maternal man could have continued his gracious 
administration? Where shall we look for the Pro- 
vidential compensation which we believe attended 
this as every other ill ?" those sorrowful problems we 
must leave, where Lincoln himself laid down so 
many of his mysterious burdens — at the feet of that 
Supreme One who is too wise to err, too good to be 
unkind. Suffice it for us that Israel moves forward, 



THE FIRST AMERICAN 35 

though Moses must be left behind. And there he 
rests forever on Nebo's lonely height, his broken life 
a monument on which his countrymen will always 
gaze with wonder and with gratitude to the myster- 
ious Providence and Grace of God. 




The Real Washington 



|W ERO- WORSHIP is one of the most pop- 
* * ular forms of natural religion. It takes 
rank with the idolatries that have led the 
hearts of men in all ages toward supreme 
objects of reverence. And who can wonder that the 
same kind of gratitude, respect and admiration which 
is rendered to Nature, or the Ideals of Faith, should 
be bestowed upon the grand realities of Life? But 
hero-worship is as easily carried to extremes as any 
other form of religion. Superstition rises to obscure 
it, and in the course of time myths and legends often 
gather around the popular name, magnifying and 
haloing it with fictitious attributes. 

The present age, however, is peculiarly one of 
careful inquiry. Beginning with Niebuhr, the sci- 
ence of historical criticism has entered all depart- 
ments of research into the past and revolutionized 
many of our opinions respecting it. This spirit is 
challenging many of the time-honored faiths of men, 
and examining with cold candor their claims to 
perpetuity. Hence disillusionment! The romance 
has faded from many a storied scene, and the char- 



38 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

acters of history are being elevated or depressed from 
their long familiar positions. 

This process of disenchantment has not spared 
our own views of the New World and its past. We 
have been called upon to give up the romantic vision 
of Aztec civilization and the prehistoric wonders of 
the Mound Builders that we formerly believed in. 
Columbus is no longer regarded as the first and only 
discoverer of this continent, nor do we blame Amer- 
icus for the naming of the Western world. We at- 
tribute less of our national strength to the Puritans 
and more to the Dutch settlers than our fathers did. 
Many in the North are willing to take milder views 
of slavery and secession than were possible formerly, 
and to acknowledge that the honors of the Civil War 
may be shared with the South. For Truth — truth 
at any cost — is now the watchword of history as of 
science. 

It is in this clear, unsparing light, that the name of 
Washington is now being placed. The absorbed 
and unqualified admiration for him which used to 
be regarded as a patriotic duty is passing away. 
That deification of the Father of his Country which 
exalted and hallowed his life beyond the reach of 
all criticism, is no more. It was once a kind of 
American religion to speak with bowed head and 



THE REAL WASHINGTON 39 

bated breath of the Moses of our national career. 
In him there were no faults, and for him there could 
be no blame. And we cannot overestimate the 
blessing to our personal and collective character of 
such a grand, overshadowing influence. The ex- 
ample of George Washington has been the inspira- 
tion of American youth, the ideal of American sol- 
diers and statesmen. His career has been a criterion 
by which all patriotism has been judged. He struck 
the keynote high for our country's voice, and all our 
destiny has been elevated because of that pitch. We 
do not like to imagine what the United States would 
have been if the name of George Washington had 
been a synonym of selfish ambition or of political 
corruption. 

But it is not in derogation of all this that historical 
criticism is compelling us to somewhat revise our 
judgments. The Father of his Country was not a 
demigod. He was not a faultless human being. 
The true story of his life does not justify an apotheo- 
sis. Rather it becomes all the more instructive and 
valuable when we find the reality behind the ro- 
mance, and see George Washington in the actual 
human garb that he wore, as a man like ourselves, 
with the infirmities and liabilities of our common 



40 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

nature, albeit graced and glorified with excellences 
such as humanity rarely possesses. 

It has been said that "character is moral order 
seen through the medium of an individual." Each 
true life is a facade of the Deity, giving front and 
expression to some of the eternal truths. What then 
does the real Washington stand for as an interpreter 
to history of moral principles? 

1 . We see in his life and character the import- 
ance of earl]) preparation to public success. 

It is the old lesson that "the heights by great men 
reached and kept, were not attained by sudden 
flight." Washington did not step at once into the 
full maturity of power and place, but reached his 
meridian by long and gradual ascent. There was 
nothing precocious, abnormal, or unaccountable 
about his development. This, however, is the judg- 
ment of recent historical criticism. For we can all 
remember how we were taught in our childhood to 
think of the Father of his Country as at one time a 
boy of almost superhuman moral quality. The stories 
of his angelic truthfulness, as shown in reported con- 
versations with his father, his refusal to believe that 
his name printed in the garden with plants was a 
product of chance, and the wonderful dream which 
his mother described as showing the faith of her son 



THE REAL WASHINGTON 41 

George in Divine Providence, these romantic inci- 
dents were once the staple instruction of American 
youth respecting the great hero. And they invested 
his name with a halo of early precocity which made 
of him a demigod in our esteem. 

But investigation has dispelled the illusion entire- 
ly. All of these stories were fictitious, and their 
origin is now well known. It seems that the Rev. 
Mason Lee Weems was a poor parson of the Epis- 
copal church, whose parish included Mount Vernon 
in Virginia. To eke out his scanty living he was 
accustomed to sell books through the country. As 
soon as General Washington died, in 1 799, it oc- 
curred to him that he might turn the great event to 
account for his own advantage. This he did by hur- 
riedly composing and publishing a biography of the 
great man. Within three months it was published, 
February 22, 1800, at first as a small pamphlet, for 
twenty-five cents, and afterwards enlarged to a re- 
spectable volume. Naturally it met with a ready 
sale, eleven editions in ten years; and for some time 
it was the only popular record of the life of the hero 
whose death the whole nation was then mourning 
with grief and veneration. 

Now if Parson Weems had been a truthful or 
even careful historian, he might have rendered an 



42 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

invaluable service to his theme and to the country 
in this unequalled privilege. But he actually in- 
vented most of the stories that he told, describing the 
early years and character of his subject as what they 
might have been, and ought to have been, according 
to his own clerical imagination. Adopting a few 
of the stories that he found circulating among the old 
people who still cherished reports which they had 
heard in former times about the Virginia hero, he 
improved on them by the help of his own unscrupu- 
lous imagination, and invested his theme with unusual 
but very attractive adventures. Of such a character 
was the now classic incident of the cherry tree and 
the hatchet; also the lesson taught the boy by his 
father, through the appearance of his name spelled 
in flowers in the garden, against the probability of 
chance or accident having anything to do with the 
origin of the world. 

This case is perhaps without a parallel in the an- 
nals of history. All the national heroes have been 
invested with legendary virtues in the course of 
time; but there is no other instance of a character 
deliberately draped with unusual qualities by a pro- 
fessional biographer who thus succeeds in establish- 
ing his fiction as one of the statues of historic renown. 
There have been fictitious biographies, but none so 



THE REAL WASHINGTON 43 

immediately successful and widely influential as this. 
The only parallel to it in American history is to be 
found in the work of another clergyman, the Rev. 
Samuel Peters, LL. D., who wrote a "General 
History of Connecticut" after the Revolutionary 
War. This abounded in malicious misrepresenta- 
tions, among them the famous "Blue Laws," which 
have given a totally false idea of the Puritan prin- 
ciples and practices of early times. 

For a long time this preternatural boy, thus por- 
trayed, was the only George Washington known to 
our nation. But now we see him as he really was. 
Born and raised in a stately home of the Old Do- 
minion, he was surrounded from birth with all the 
advantages of the best society of the period. His 
parents were of good intellectual and moral quali- 
ties, the mother especially, who survived the father 
by many years. It was a time of social culture, but 
few scholarly accomplishments. Such was the en- 
vironment in which George grew up. He was neith- 
er better nor worse than the most of the lads around 
him. He was a fair specimen of the average young 
Virginian — truthful, honorable, spirited, fond of ath- 
letic sports and contests, brave to a fault and fore- 
most in all deeds of daring. He had the natural 
power of command, the leader's gift. He was 



44 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

never sent to school, but had careful training under 
a private tutor by whom he was made acquainted 
with good English literature. Addison was his fa- 
vorite author. But he could never have been a 
scholar or a literary man. His aptitudes were all 
for practical and public life. At the age of fifteen 
he was already a surveyor. This was his chosen 
profession, and at that time it was a very important 
office in the new country, where boundaries must be 
fixed continually in the wilderness. Young Wash- 
ington proved to be a thorough and accurate surveyor 
whose work remains to this day unchallenged. It 
was his service to the pioneers in the wilderness that 
brought him before the public and led the way to his 
after eminence. 

As such we are to think of him. For ten years 
he was a patient toiler on the frontiers, braving the 
hardships of the most exposed business then possible 
to a gentleman. Thus he slowly matured in char- 
acter, learning the lessons of self-control, industry 
and fidelity to duty which were so prominent in his 
after life. During the Indian and French Vv'^ars 
he served as a subordinate and there acquired the 
rudiments of military knowledge. It was in the 
midst of dangers and difficulties of the most trying 
kind, of defeat and disaster, that he acquired the 



THE REAL WASHINGTON 45 

strong, stern qualities that fitted him for the leader- 
ship of the American Revolution. Never was an 
unconscious candidate for the honors of fame sub- 
jected to a more rigorous and painful ordeal of 
preparation. 

Needless to pause here and apply this great prin- 
ciple to our own instruction, that no great success is 
ever achieved except along the lines of natural and 
orderly evolution. If David, or Paul, or Luther, 
or Cromwell, or Napoleon, or Washington, stepped 
suddenly forth and surprised the world with their 
mastery of a crisis, it is only because they had been 
in training for the emergency beforehand. 

2. We are taught the value of self-control and 
moral restraint in the development of character. 

The real Washington was very far from being the 
faultless, perfectly-endowed being whom American 
patriotism has worshiped. He had in fact his full 
share of the infirmities of humanity. For one thing, 
his temperament was naturally ardent, his passions 
strong. He was very sensitive to annoyances, and 
showed on certain occasions extreme irascibility. But 
who ever thinks of George Washington as an irri- 
table, ill-tempered man? He had all the elements 
of volcanic explosion in his heart; but he knew that 
they were there and it was the study and practice of 



46 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

his life to master them. In this he succeeded so well 
as to become an exemplar of calmness, self-posses- 
sion, and evenness of temper. Occasionally the se- 
cret fire burst forth and then his wrath was said to 
be something tremendous and terrible, as when he 
stormed at Lee for his cowardice at Monmouth and 
checked with tempestuous invective the flying troops 
on Long Island. But few of those who gazed with 
reverence on his patient endurance amid agitations 
and annoyances that disheartened everyone else, sus- 
pected that he was superior to others simply because 
of his greater self-control. 

Physically, he was, like Lincoln, of giant mold. 
Over six feet in height, with the limbs of an athlete, 
and weighing two hundred pounds, he was, in his 
prime, the strongest man in the army. His boots 
were number thirteen. His hands were so large that 
gloves must be made to order for him. He could 
lift with one arm a weight which it required two men 
to carry. To hold a musket in one hand and dis- 
charge it at arm's length was a common feat with 
him. Yet in all his movements he showed the grace 
and lightness of perfect equipoise, never parading 
his strength or impressing others with the idea of 
brute force. His weak points were of a bronchial 



THE REAL WASHINGTON 47 

and pulmonary character, by which his death v/as 
caused at last. 

He was also by nature inclined to pride and re- 
serve. Patrician blood flowed in his veins. His 
family were of the higher order of the province and 
in those times the aristocratic distinctions of society 
were as marked in Virginia as in England. There 
was a wide remove, it must be remembered, between 
the plain commonalty of Massachusetts or Connecti- 
cut, where all were on one basis of mental and moral 
worth, and the artificial divisions of the Southern 
Colonies, where the caste spirit prevailed. The real 
Washington was marked by this peculiarity, and he 
never quite parted with the grand air, the hauteur, 
of his high-born ancestry. Something of the lord 
of the manor always invested him with a reserve 
which repelled any familiarity. No one ever ven- 
tured to lake a liberty with General Washington. 
It was said that Lafayette once, for a wager, address- 
ed him in a jocose, hail-fellow manner, but he never 
repeated the experiment. 

And yet there was not a trace of haughtiness or 
exclusive disdain in the manner of the great leader. 
Dignified and self-contained, he was yet at all times 
open and affable to all, treating every one, high and 
low, with the same considerateness which he required 



48 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

for himself. Although at the outbreak of the 
Revolution probably the richest man in America, and 
always distinguished for the elegance of his attire 
and the splendor of his equipage, traveling in state 
wherever he went, he impressed no one with a sense 
of aristocratic privilege. For he made of his special 
advantages the means of popular benefit. The poor- 
est and the weakest looked up to him with con- 
fidence. 

This, too, was the result of self-culture on his 
part; for it was not a common trait with the gentry 
of his class. Hie Virginia land-holder of the old 
regime was usually far removed from the plebeian 
multitude. But what Thomas Jefferson learned of 
social equality and republican simplicity, by his con- 
tact with the revolutionists of France, George Wash- 
ington acquired by his own good sense and moral 
consciousness. 

Again we are taught the truth which history 
everywhere affirms, that all goodness, all greatness, 
is capable of and demands cultivation. It is not 
self-procured or spontaneous. Nor is moral nobil- 
ity always a product of favorable conditions. As 
in the case of George Washington, it may be the 
harvest of a painful preparation. There was much 
in his endowment and environment to make of him a 



THE REAL WASHINGTON 49 

proud, choleric, self-willed man, vain of his birth, 
extravagant with his money, arbitrary in his power. 
What was it that gave to him the grand, statuesque 
demeanor of serene justice and generous utility which 
presides over our country's history like an ideal of 
perfect manhood? It was the painstaking self-cul- 
ture of a soul aware of its own weakness and deter- 
mined to make itself strong. 

The real Washington was a man not entirely su- 
perior to the level of his day. He purchased lottery 
tickets without compunction; he indulged in wine- 
drinking, temperately; he took part in social festiv- 
ities, which included dancing and theatre-going at 
times; he raised and sold tobacco, although he nevei 
used it himself; he owned slaves, but strongly dis- 
approved of the slave trade. With regard to relig- 
ion, he had neither the fervid spirituality of Jonathan 
Edwards nor the ethical self-righteousness of Ben- 
jamin Franklin. A devout communicant of the 
Episcopal Church, he professed no experience of 
grace such as orthodoxy in our sense of the term 
requires. But his reverence for the Bible was pro- 
found. At the crises of his life he was known to de- 
pend upon humble prayer to God for help. In his 
orders to the army and in his communications to Con- 
gress, he repeatedly professed faith in Divine Provi- 



50 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

dence. This was what moral principle meant with 
him. It was the inspiration of the will of God. And 
when we observe how humility and unselfishness al- 
ways accompanied his professional greatness, that he 
was as unwilling to take up his high office at the first 
as he was ready to lay it down at the last, we feel that 
such a life must have been under the influence of 
Divine authority. 

What else could have inspired him with the almost 
superhuman wisdom which he showed as a general 
and statesman, the patience under crushing burdens, 
the calm confidence in the midst of darkness? He 
might have repeated the course of Cromwell and as- 
sumed a crown, which the army and many of the 
people were ready to bestow upon him at the close 
of the war; but Ambition had no power over a life 
whose guiding star was Duty. The self-denial which 
prompted the sacrifices of comfort at the first bade 
him also refuse the rewards of victory at the last. 
And now that we look back and see the splendor 
of his entire career, we learn from it no higher lesson 
than this — the benign results of loyalty to the moral 
law, the 

" High, stern-featured beauty 
Of plain devotedness to duty." 



THE REAL WASHINGTON 51 

Oh, that in our day, when hberty so often means 
hcense, and self-conceit takes the place of self-cul- 
ture, when Young America is the synonym for rash 
independence of restraint and precocious progress 
of all kinds, the grand shadow of the Father of his 
Country might fall with solemnizing and softening 
effect upon the noisy waves of modern selfishness 
and agitation. 

3 The real Washington illustrates the supe- 
rior excellence of sijmme/rij of character. 

If we ask what was his special claim to our su- 
preme regard, we may find it difficult to answer. For, 
on examination, we find that at no one point was he 
peculiarly gifted in advance of other great men. He 
had not the military genius of Napoleon, nor the 
practical versatility of Franklin, nor the financial 
skill of Hamilton nor the political finesse of Jefferson. 
There have been many of the heroes of time who 
were his superiors in certain salient features of char- 
acter. But no man ever lived who was his equal in 
compass and combination. His life had that rarest 
of qualities, equipoise and symmetry. It was well- 
balanced and rounded out on all sides. He seemed 
to be equally great in the cabinet or in the camp, 
as a warrior and as a ruler, as a public functionary 
and as a private citizen. He carried the same stately 



52 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

bearing through the routine of home hfe as amid the 
duties of official position. As a householder and 
planter, he showed extreme attention to trifles, econo- 
my in details and painstaking industry. His business 
accounts, written in a careful, clerkly hand, remain 
as evidence that nothing escaped his attention in the 
domestic management or that of his plantation. And 
this at the very times when, as General or as Presi- 
dent, he was apparently absorbed in national affairs. 
And perhaps it was this evenness of outline which 
has prevented his character from making the impres- 
sion on the world which other lives, sharper or more 
distinguished at particular points, have made. We 
can easily understand why Thomas Carlyle did not 
think much of George Washington. For truly one 
whose ideal of greatness was satisfied with Frederick, 
and his eccentric, stormy career, would find little 
to admire in the self-denial and moderation of the 
American patriot. That a man should refuse an 
offered crown and sheathe his sword at the close of 
war without regret, should unwillingly assume the 
Chief Magistracy of a new nation and then retire 
to private life when his duties were over, with alac- 
rity, and subside into complete subordination with 
a proud humility — all this was below (or above) 
the level of Carlyle's dramatic ideas of heroism. 



THE REAL WASHINGTON 53 

But we, as a nation, cannot be too grateful to Divine 
Providence that the Father of his Country belonged 
to the race of Samuel, Cincinnatus, Gustavus Vasa 
and William of Orange — patriots whose unselfish 
zeal was their real greatness, and whose claim to 
immortality lay as much in what they did not, as in 
what they did. 

4 Finally; we must not forget that no true 
success can be achieved in this world without extreme 
and painful cost. 

If the name of Washington now shines peerless 
in the firmament of American history, it did not 
rise to that meridian glory unchallenged. Nor was 
it alone in its worth. Let us remember how many 
others contributed to the success of which he was 
the brightest exponent. At the very outset of his 
military career, Washington owed much to the 
patriotic devotion of General Artemas Ward, the 
first soldier of New England, who sacrificed his own 
ambition in welcoming the Virginia stranger as 
head of the army and greatly helped him in the 
conquest of Boston. And the final victory at York- 
town was largely due to the wise advice of Robert 
Morris, then Secretary of the Treasury, who not 
only urged the American and French generals to 
attack Cornwallis instead of New York, as they 



54 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

at first intended, but by his contributions of money 
and means at his own expense enabled them to make 
a great campaign. Robert Morris died a poor man, 
having sacrificed everything to his country's service. 
These names are httle heeded now, but they should 
not be suffered to lapse into oblivion ! For Washing- 
ton fully acknowledged his indebtedness to them 
at the time. 

But he had his enemies as well. All through his 
public life he encountered opposition. While in 
command of the army he was plotted against by 
some of his own officers, and a very powerful party 
was once formed in Congress, for the purpose of 
displacing him by General Gates. Afterward, as 
President, he was unsparingly attacked by the ex- 
treme Republicans, who resented his affiliation with 
the Federalists, the aristocratic party, as they were 
called. It is surprising to look through the literature 
of that day and observe the caricatures and offensive 
remarks often directed against the head of the nation. 
On the day of his retirement from the Presidency a 
Philadelphia paper published an outrageous article 
in abuse of him, because of his opposition to radical 
measures; "If ever a nation has been deceived by a 
man, the American nation has been deceived by 
Washington. Let his conduct serve as a warning 



THE REAL WASHINGTON 55 

that no man should be an idol." But the storm 
passed by and left the mountain great and grand as 
ever. And there it has been towering ever since, 
like a peak scarred by the lightning and worn by 
the wind and weather of the years, but dominating 
the landscape still, heir of the sunset and herald 
of morn. 

Such trials only form a new link in the chain 
which has been uncoiling through the ages, wit- 
nessing to every land that pain is the price of good 
forever. With nations as with individuals, life 
costs life ; and true patriotism is ever of that maternal 
spirit which makes a sacrifice of itself for the sake of 
the unborn generations. 

Chateaubriand saw Washington only once, but 
the impressionable Frenchman never forgot that sight. 
"I have felt warmed by it all the rest of my life", 
said he. "Nothing base, or vile, or selfish could 
live in the presence of Washington." 

The Indians of the West used to have a tradition 
that the Great Father, as they called him, was 
carried at death to their own happy hunting-grounds. 
Alone of all white men, he was admitted to that 
blest abode; and there he sits in solemn dignity for- 
ever, receiving the reverence of every Indian who 
enters that land of rest. 



56 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

In the city that bears his name, on the shore of 
the river that he loved, not far from his own manorial 
home, a stately shaft was for a long time rising. 
Complete at last, it is composed of stones furnished 
by every state of the vast confederation whose in- 
fancy he helped to rear. But the true monument 
of Washington is one not yet finished and that can- 
not be finished while time endures. It is rising 
higher perpetually, as each generation adds its trib- 
ute to his memory. Let our lives help it upward, 
by their recognition of his worth and their imitation 
of his example. 





JONATHAN EDWARDS 



Jonathan Edwards and 
Benjamin Franklin 



"^T y ■ T would be difficult to estimate the debt 
^^■^ which this nation owes to New England. 
^^^§ As the geologist finds the northern part 
of the American continent ground and worn 
with traces of the Ice Period, whose drift was 
from the northeast towards the southwest, 
fashioning hills and valleys according to its an- 
cient flow, so does the historian discover every- 
where through the records of the northern 
States witnesses of the great influence which the 
northeastern section of this country has had on the 
political, religious, mental and social life of our land. 
That region of rigorous climate, rugged scenery, 
and thriftj'^ intellectual and moral habits has exerted 
a great formative force on the development of our 
nation. 

Going back to the New England of two hundred 
years ago, we behold a cluster of colonies settled 
by an influx of the best popular elements of the 
Old World. It was the England of Shakespeare 



58 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

and Milton, of Cromwell and the Commonwealth, 
of the Puritans and their biblical faith, that gave 
to the Americans of that period their distinctive 
characteristics.. They were intensely devoted to 
mental and moral culture. An illiterate person was 
despised. Some kind of schooling was compulsory 
on all children. The early establishment of Harvard 
College bore witness to their respect for education, 
as the endowment of Brown University, at Provi- 
dence, showed their insistence on freedom of thought. 
It must be acknowledged that the religion of 
those times was often extreme in its requirements. 
No person could vote in a Town Meeting who was 
not a church member, and no one could remain 
outside the pale of that membership without being 
treated as a heathen and a reprobate. All the officers 
of the church and their functions were of political 
appointment. The minister of each New England 
parish was appointed by law, and his support was 
provided by general taxation. Invested with secular 
as well as spiritual authority, he was treated by the 
local community with the respect due to a divine- 
human office. Anyone criticizing a sermon was pun- 
ishable by law. The pulpit of those times was often 
the sole source of popular instruction. No objection 
was made to sermons of one, two, or three hours' 



EDWARDS AND FRANKLIN 59 

duration. The long prayer in the Sabbath service 
might be an hour in length, and the psalm rendered 
by the choir half an hour long. This too in bleak, 
wintry weather, when there was no means of warm- 
ing the wooden edifice on the hill-top. The obser- 
vance of the Lord's Day was enforced in the most 
rigorous manner, which to us now seems bigoted 
and despotic. 

But it must be remembered that the dogmatic, 
polemic and severe type of religion thus developed 
was exactly adapted to the needs of a pioneer race, 
who must conquer the wilderness and endure 
the hardships of an exposed and perilous 
life. It was the stern, strong spirit of the 
Puritans which sowed the seed and laid the founda- 
tions of the ethical, intellectual and progressive enter- 
prises of after days. To those early impulses was 
due the subsequent development of a Lowell, a Long- 
fellow, an Emerson, a Sumner, a Phillips and a 
Garrison. 

It is to two typical characters which represent 
different aspects of this colonial life that attention 
is now invited. Jonathan Edwards may be regarded 
as the best specimen of its spiritual and intellectual 
power, Benjamin Franklin of its ethical and material 
tendencies. 



60 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

Jonathan Edwards has always been spoken of as 
the most eminent production of a class of men to 
whom our colonial period owes more than to any 
other — the Ministers of the Gospel. He was born in 
1 703, his mother being a woman of superior charac- 
ter and culture, remarkable for her fervent piety 
and her theological knowledge. His father and 
grandfather were Christian ministers, and all his 
ancestors for many generations had been persons of 
intellectual and moral power. It was no wonder 
then that the child of such antecedents should de- 
velop a mental and spiritual precocity which in his 
early years gave promise of great results. At the 
age of twelve he was already an advanced scholar, 
not only versed in the classics but busy with the prob- 
lems of philosophy. Entering Yale College when 
he was thirteen years old, he was graduated at 
seventeen, with the highest honors then obtainable. 

His scholarship embraced all of the knowledge 
taught in the schools, but his chosen field was intel- 
lectual and moral philosophy. He soon showed 
himself to be, what throughout life he remained, the 
first metaphysician of the age. Deeply read in the 
sensational philosophy of Locke, which was then 
very popular, he was also an independent thinker. 
As a boy he was fond of pondering the problems of 



EDWARDS AND FRANKLIN 61 

existence, such as the nature of the will, of abstract 
truth, the Being of God, and the relation of His 
government to human freedom. Berkeley's system 
of philosophic idealism, and Spinoza's grand idea 
of the universal immanence of the Deity shaped and 
colored his mind ; but he was the servant of no master. 
Alone and independently he worked his way to a 
philosophy of his own, which embraced the mysti- 
cism of the Schoolmen with the scientific accuracy 
and logical completeness of Augustine and Calvin. 
He was indeed a rare combination of lofty imagina- 
tion with rigid intellectuality, a poet's idealism with 
a logician's method. Throughout life he continued 
to be a seer like John; a theologian like Paul. 

Naturally his religious experience was of a pecu- 
liar, even phenomenal, character. Brought up in 
that intense Puritan atmosphere, charged with the 
ozone of religious thought and belief, he absorbed 
its stimulating influence from infancy. To this pen- 
sive child, alert at every pore with spiritual con- 
sciousness, the cold, bare meeting house with its 
austere simplicity of service, was a temple of God, 
full of the Shechinah glory. No cathedral with 
high embossed roof, and dim religious light, and 
rolling music, and altar splendor, was needed to 
make of him a worshiper. Wherever he was, — at 



62 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

home, in the woods, the fields, the solemn night, he 
was surrounded and attended by the Divine pres- 
ence. Indeed he seems never to have been a mere 
boy, with the usual characteristics of juvenile ignor- 
ance and folly. From the first he was a grave, 
thoughtful character, reverent and pure, gentle and 
good, as Samuel ministering before the Lord in the 
Tabernacle of old. 

His conversion was characteristic. Although he 
was probably regenerated in his early youth, his 
distinct religious experience began with a vision of 
God granted him during his college course. There, 
on reading one day the words; "Now unto the King 
eternal, immortal, invisible, the only God, be honor 
and glory forever. Amen!" there came to him an 
inward and sweet delight in Divine things. Like 
Paul, he was caught up to the third heaven and 
heard the unspeakable language. Thenceforth he 
was filled with the love of Christ and a sense of the 
Holy Spirit. All things became new to him, and 
all things were of God. On the one hand he was 
filled with horror at the abysmal depths of depravity, 
the awful guilt and danger of sin, in himself and 
in the world. On the other, he was enraptured 
with the beauty of holiness. He saw the Divine 
beauty in the flowers of the field, the Divine power 



EDWARDS AND FRANKLIN 63 

in winds and waters, the Divine mystery in the night, 
and the Divine glory in sunrise and sunset. Like 
Enoch, he walked with God. And all this spirit- 
ual meditation took form in resolutions for the 
religious life as exact, minute and practical as any 
that ever bound monk or nun to their life of devo- 
tional routine. Every thought and word and deed, 
every process of mind and operation of heart, must 
be devoted to the Spirit's divine service. He would 
live in God and for God and by God. 

And yet Jonathan Edwards did not become a 
mere mystic or ascetic recluse. Perhaps in other 
times and places he might have been drawn into the 
retired abstractions of a St. Jerome or a John Tauler; 
but living in practical New England, his piety was 
constrained into the definite channel of church work. 
Ordained to the ministry of the Gospel in his twenty- 
fourth year, after careful theological preparation, 
he became the pastor of the large and flourishing 
parish at Northampton, then one of the most emi- 
nent in the colony. Here he approved himself as 
a thoroughly successful Christian preacher. So far 
from being a mere idealist, he was a man of rich 
and varied qualities. As the husband of a gifted 
woman (of whom he has left a most romantic de- 
scription, fervent with poetic rhapsody) as the father 



64 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

of a large family, as a citizen and a friend, he 
showed himself versatile and vigorous in all the 
relations of life. 

It was as a preacher that he excelled. Devoting 
himself to thirteen hours of daily toil in his study, 
his sermons were models of learning, spirituality, 
and practical usefulness. Tall and slender in person, 
with a face of feminine purity and intellectual power, 
refined in manner, yet capable of the most intense 
earnestness, he soon became known as the first 
preacher of the land. For he was more than a phil- 
osopher and a theologian. He possessed the spiritual 
insight of a prophet and the fiery zeal of an apostle. 
His sermons were metaphysical in their acute analysis 
of truth, but they were also fervently evangelical 
and practical. He preached the law of God in 
all its authority. The terrible nature and desert 
of sin were insisted on. The sinner was warned 
of his danger and urged toward the way of salvation 
by Christ. These great doctrines were proclaimed 
with a fidelity and power which were overwhelming. 
Tradition still bears witness to the tremendous 
effect of Jonathan Edwards' appeal to sinners to 
flee from the wrath to come. His sermon on Sin- 
ners in the Hands of an Angr}) God is historical in 
the annals of the pulpit. Yet he was equally true 



EDWARDS AND FRANKLIN 65 

to the beauties and the attractiveness of the Gospel. 
No preacher ever set forth the hohness of God in its 
winsome aspects and the glories of the ideal hfe 
more effectively than he. 

Now all this pulpit ministration must be set against 
a background of general religious declension. For 
the land was then full of spiritual coldness and dark- 
ness. The capital mistake of New England puri- 
tanism in identifying church and state was already 
bearing fruit. By taking everyone into the church, 
the church had become secularized. Religion was 
largely a matter of conventionality and form. The 
preaching of the day corresponded to this state of 
things, in its avoidance of spiritual truth and its pref- 
erence for mere moralities. The Half-way Cove- 
nant, 1662, had made of church membership a 
compromise between worldliness and spirituality. 
Against all this Edwards protested. He restored 
the standard of apostolic purity, and insisted on the 
Divine life as the test of religion. So fervently did 
he preach the necessity of regeneration that a genu- 
ine revival of grace broke out in his own parish, and 
thence extended throughout the entire region. It 
was known as "the Great Awakening" and by it one 
tenth of the population of New England are said to 
have been converted. 



66 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

But this recurrence to the primitive piety of the 
church aroused the enmity of the formal professors 
of rehgion. The faithful preaching of the man of 
God was unwelcome to the Pharisees and Saddu- 
cees of the day; and as they were in the majority, 
he was deposed from his eminent position, to the 
irreparable loss of the pulpit of New England. This 
humiliation was intensified by what followed. The 
one position which was opened to him was that of 
missionary to the Indians at the small frontier vil- 
lage of Stockbridge, where in poverty and ill health 
this noble and renowned man found himself restrict- 
ed to a small and unappreciative circle of settlers 
and aborigines. 

It seemed at first like the putting of a great light 
under a bushel, but it proved to be only another 
of the mysterious ways of Providence, which have 
so often led through darkness into greater light. 
For the banishment of Edwards was like the im- 
prisonment of Bunyan and the blindness of Milton. 
It forced him into a new and larger scope of influence. 
There, in the solitude of the wilderness, he com- 
posed the immortal works by which he has since 
been most widely known' the Essa^ on the Freedom 
of the Will, the Doctrine of Original Sin, and other 
famous treatises of philosophy and theology. His 



EDWARDS AND FRANKLIN 67 

writings soon gave him a reputation far beyond the 
range of his pulpit. His fame spread throughout the 
colonies and extended to Europe. After a few 
years he was invited to the Presidency of Princeton 
College, the greatest honor then possible to a Chris- 
tian minister, but he did not long survive his return 
to civilization, dying in 1 758, at the age of fifty-four. 
Thus terminated the richest and most influential 
career known to the Christian ministry in America, 
before the Revolution. No other name shines so 
brightly as that of Jonathan Edwards in the Annals 
of the American pulpit. He represented all that 
was best in the religious development of New Eng- 
land, and he gave to its history a new and needed 
impulse. Rescuing the church from the bonds of 
formalism, he bequeathed to its future that won- 
derful blending of intellectual and spiritual 
power which rendered the Christian ministry 
one of the strongest elements of success in the 
Revolutionary period and afterward. We owe 
it largely under God to him and his lofty 
ideal of religious life that Christianity has been 
the corner-stone of our history as a nation. It 
should be said also that the family lines which were 
originated by him have been wonderfully prolific 
in the richest tributes of life to this nation. Among 



68 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

his lineal descendants have been counted one hun- 
dred college presidents and professors and clergy- 
men, twenty-five officers in the army and navy, one 
hundred and thirty lawyers and judges, sixty phy- 
sicians and eighty governors, senators and mayors. 
But there was another side of New England life 
and history which deserves attention. In addition 
to its intense religiousness, its profound moral cul- 
ture and devotion to the forms of doctrinal Chris- 
tianity, there was an equally fervid spirit of practi- 
cal and independent thought. This was, from the 
first, expressed in the habits of industry, commercial 
enterprise and mechanical ingenuity, which have 
given to the Yankee his special reputation. None of 
the other colonies equalled the New Englanders 
for shrewd thrift, acute thoughtfulness and the 
genius of profit and loss. There is no need to show 
that these traits flourish pre-eminently to the pres- 
ent day. Now it was as the best product and promo- 
ter of this phase of New England character that 
Benjamin Franklin appeared and lived his life during 
the eighteenth century. He was the most complete 
embodiment of the material, as Edwards was of the 
spiritual, tendencies of his age. And no other man 
of his times contributed so much of impulse and 
education to the ethical and mechanical develop- 



EDWARDS AND FRANKLIN 69 

ment of the American people. If Edwards was 
the seer, the prophet of our early history, the apostle 
of its spiritual idealism, Franklin was the incarnation 
of its common-sense, the pioneer of American utili- 
tarianism, of that strong, practical wisdom which 
has been the guiding principle of our national history. 
There could hardly be a greater contrast than that 
between the early years of Franklin and Edwards. 
The former was born in 1 706, in the town of 
Boston. His ancestors had been sturdy English 
yeomen, remarkable for nothing but industry and 
Protestantism. His father was a plain working 
man, a maker of candles, and Benjamin was one of 
the youngest in a very large family of children. 
The lad grew up in an atmosphere of manual labor, 
and had no intellectual advantages except the com- 
pulsory education which Boston then provided for 
all the boys. According to law, he must go to 
school and learn to read and write. With this 
scant equipment, Benjamin began his career as a 
laborer in his father's shop. But he had an irre- 
pressible thirst for knowledge. Books were few 
and costly then, but every volume that the boy could 
beg or borrow or buy was eagerly devoured by him. 
He soon showed the independent mind and critical 
spirit which distinguished him through life. At 



70 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

the age of fifteen he was studying Addison's Spec- 
tator and forming from it the clear and vigorous style 
which always marked his writings. 

More remarkable still, he had become a skeptic 
in religious matters. Reading the works of English 
free-thinkers, Shaftesbury and Collins, he adopted 
their principles with regard to the supernatural ele- 
ment in Christianity. This, in New England, the 
very home of orthodoxy, and in Boston, the shrine 
of Colonial faith, was something phenomenal. What- 
ever shadow it casts on his moral nature, it speaks 
volumes for the intellectual courage and originality 
of this boy of fifteen, that he had the mind to form 
and the spirit to avow unbelief then and there. 
He was connected with an elder brother in 
publishing a newspaper, which was nearly the 
first of its kind in New England; and for it he 
wrote many articles which were very popular. But 
his independency of criticism cost him his position 
and at the age of seventeen he left Boston, — in fact, 
ran away, to seek his fortune elsewhere. 

Thus began that romantic story, so well known 
to all American readers, of the young adventurer 
making his way slowly by water to New York, fail- 
ing to find employment there and then trudging on 
foot across New Jersey to the far-distant town of 



EDWARDS AND FRANKLIN 71 

Philadelphia. The picture of the tired youth, 
dusty and wayworn, walking up the streets of the 
Quaker settlement, a roll of bread under each arm 
and a few shillings in his pocket, looking anxiously 
for a place to work and sleep, is a favorite scene in 
our historic gallery. Thus Franklin entered the 
place of his life-long labors, and became a member 
of the city which was to prize his name as the no- 
blest ornament of its history. 

We can give but the briefest sketch of his private 
and public career. Beginning as a journeyman 
printer, he became the publisher of a paper and of 
other works which were very influential. By faith- 
ful industry, shrewd thrift and enterprise, he was 
successful in business and amassed property. He 
was also very active in public affairs. Gradually 
he acquired great influence with the people as a 
critic of wrongs and a constructor of reforms. He 
was always suggesting improvements and introduc- 
ing better ways of life. He was the first to propose 
and form a public library, a hospital in Philadelphia, 
a free academy, and the use of fertilizers by the 
farmers. He invented a stove for the consump- 
tion of coal, and a lightning-rod for the protection 
of houses. He was the first to advocate an efficient 
fire department. He reorganized the Post Office 



72 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY' 

and gave it the beginning of its present usefulness. 
He was the father of the newspaper and the maga- 
zine in their present popular forms. He opened the 
scientific study of electricity, and tried to form a 
society for scientific intercourse. He was the first 
American scientist to be recognized as such in 
Europe, and the first American writer to gain gen- 
eral attention in the world of literature. In short, 
he \vas perpetually busy on the practical side of life, 
pointing out defects and remedying them, advising 
and providing the means of progress. 

He was thus the pioneer of American invention 
and improvement, the embodiment of that restless 
spirit of advance which has since become a national 
trait, and of the inductive philosophy which has en- 
riched our land with scientific discoveries. TTie 
shrewd, ingenious American who can turn his hand 
to everything, ^vho has opened the great West to 
civilization and filled the land with labor-saving 
machinery and scientific achievements, who has 
made the whole world feel the stress and stir of 
American enterprise, — he should look back to Ben- 
jamin Franklin as to his ancestor or his prototype. 
This genius of utilitarianism found its best expres- 
sion in the Almanac which Franklin published year- 
ly for a long time and which, known as "Poor Rich- 



EDWARDS AND FRANKLIN 73 

ard's Almanack," was in its day the most popular 
thing of the kind ever known. Indeed, it should be 
regarded as one of the important elements in the 
formation of our national character; for no publi- 
cation of the eighteenth century had a more pro- 
found influence on the young life of the Colonial 
period. 

In the eighteenth century the yearly Almanac was 
the one universal book of the common people. It 
took the place now filled by the newspaper. Every 
farmer, every artisan, possessed and used a small 
rude pamphlet which, with the monthly and week- 
ly calendar, contained a brief digest of other and use- 
ful information. Franklin adopted this method of 
supplying the people with periodical literature in its 
simplest form. He used the daily calendar as a 
cord on which to string maxims, general observations, 
ethical precepts, which, as the utterances of "Poor 
Richard," passed into general circulation as the 
coin-current of popular thought. Ten thousand 
copies of this book were issued yearly, and it was 
regarded as, next to the Bible, the most familiar 
authority with the common people. The results of 
this instruction of the people were illimitable. How 
great the influence on a young and growing race of 
such rules for life as these: "Keep thy shop, and 



74 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

thy shop will keep thee;" "God helps them that 
help themselves;" "Lost time is never found again;" 
"Constant dropping vv^ears aw^ay stones;" "Exper- 
ience keeps a dear school, but fools will learn in 
no other;" "If you would have a faithful servant, 
serve yourself;" "Rather go to bed supperless than 
rise in debt." 

These wise maxims, scattered broadcast over the 
virgin soil of the colonies, were the best possible 
seed with which to provide for its future. Franklin 
imbued the infancy and youth of our nation with the 
principles of industry, thrift, enterprise, honesty, — 
the practical virtues of worldly success. What the 
sayings of Epictetus and Aesop's Fables were to 
Greece, and Solomon's Proverbs to the Hebrews, 
and Rochefoucauld's Aphorisms, and Tupper's 
Proverbial Philosophy, and Spurgeon's John 
Ploughman's Talk were to modern civiliza- 
tion, that was the shrewd, homely wit of 
Franklin to our Colonial history. He was, 
in fact, the Socrates of America, a universal critic 
and instructor, who made it his business from first 
to last to expose all errors and build up practical 
righteousness. As a writer, his style was simple, 
clear, direct and powerful, the Addison of our lit- 
erature. But his humor was so keen and his logic 



EDWARDS AND FRANKLIN 75 

so strong that he reached every mind and convinced 
all alike. No wonder that as a moralist he was 
everywhere listened to, that as a scientific explorer 
he acquired a world-wide reputation, that as a poli- 
tician he took rank with the leaders of the day. 

We need hardly speak of his services to his coun- 
try during the Revolution, as a public adviser during 
the French wars, as a member of the Continental 
Congress, as a representative of the Colonies in Eng- 
land, and afterwards in France. His patriotic use- 
fulness at home and abroad associate him with the 
great names of Adams, Jefferson and Washington. 
His calm and catholic wisdom, his shrewd sense and 
versatile ability, gave to the struggling colonies a 
European celebrity that helped them to the French 
alliance without which their cause could not have 
triumphed. Thus he lived the most varied and, in 
the practical sense, the most useful life ever lived 
by an American. And when he died both the Old 
World and the New did homage to his memory. 
The signature of Benjamin Franklin is the only 
American name written to the Declaration of Inde- 
pendence, the Treaty of French Alliance, the Trea- 
ty of Peace, and the Federal Constitution. It is 
also the most eminent ornament of the literature and 
civilization of the eighteenth century. 



76 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

But now think of the contrast between FrankHn 
and Edwards. Both were among the formative 
influences of our early history, yet how different in 
spirit, style and effect. Edwards was the spiritual 
seer, the religious leader, the theological organizer of 
his day. Franklin was the incarnation of its com- 
mon-sense, the inspirer of practical wisdom, the 
teacher of morality. The philosophy of Franklin 
was purely utilitarian. His one ideal was profit. 
Whatever made men wiser, more industrious and 
economical, more intelligent and comfortable and 
secure, that was good to him. For creeds and dog- 
mas he cared nothing. All the subtleties of meta- 
physical debate which Edwards delighted in, all 
the polemics of theology which the New England 
divines were devoted to, were useless and meaning- 
less to him. He recognized the church and its 
forms of worship, was always respectful toward oth- 
er men's conscientious beliefs, but for himself virtue 
was the chief good. He professed a firm belief in 
a personal God and His government over the world. 
He prized the Bible for its pure laws and ethical 
wisdom, but Self-knowledge, Self-culture, Self-con- 
trol, were the leading doctrines of Franklin's creed. 
Yet no one saw more clearly the beauty of Jesus 
of Nazareth as the ideal of humanity, and when he 



EDWARDS AND FRANKLIN 77 

died his last gaze was directed to a picture of the 
Man of Nazareth, which hung on the wall above 
his bed. 

We have said that Jonathan Edwards and Ben- 
jamin Franklin represent two opposite developments 
of the New England character and life. They 
were almost antipodal in their extreme divergence 
from each other. And yet, in the retrospect of his- 
tory, it is plain that each was an incomplete contri- 
bution to the formation of our national life. Neith- 
er of these two men could have done the work of the 
other, nor could either of them have been spared 
from the general composition; for if the pure spirit- 
uality and the refined intellectualism of the great 
preacher were needed to give to American thought 
a lofty religious ideal, not less was the practical 
wisdom and moralistic influence of the other nec- 
essary to shape our growing life with positive virtues. 

Indeed, does not Christianity embrace both of 
these elements, the heavenly and the earthly, the 
spiritual and the material, in its perfect scope? 
Certainly the Bible contains and insists upon them. 
If it presents the abstract holiness of the Divine ex- 
istence as our model, it also lays down the Ten Com- 
mandments and the Golden Rule as the concrete 
path of human duty. If it reveals to us the Son of 



78 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

God in his pre-existent glory, it also shows him as 
the man of active obedience and practical usefulness 
in the world. Side by side with the sentimental 
effusions of the Psalms is the practical wisdom of 
the Proverbs. The Gospels contain the Sermon 
on the Mount, with its outline of positive virtues, as 
well as the prayer of Jesus for a heavenly home for 
his disciples. 

It is the Acts of the apostles, not their Theories, 
Hopes, or Aspirations, that we read in the New 
Testament. And if John opens to us the visionary 
splendors of the City of God on high, James keeps 
us down to the plain routine of duty here and now. 
Thus we find the dualism of Truth. It has ever 
the two sides of the abstract and the concrete, the 
general and the particular, the spiritual and the ma- 
terial; just as our own nature is composed of soul 
and body, the immaterial and the physical, both of 
which must be cultivated to secure a complete human 
development. 

Therefore, we rejoice in the Providence which 
provided for the infancy of our national life two 
such elemental forces as Edwards and Franklin. 
Without the unworldly idealism of the former, 
American civilization might have been limited to the 
low plane of merely moral culture and mechanical 



EDWARDS AND FRANKLIN 79 

success. Without the utilitarian genius of the other, 
this country might have been the home of visionaries, 
incapable of more than religious enthusiasm or a 
mystical theology. It was the happy combination 
of these distinct attributes which has resulted in our 
complex nationality, at once idealistic in its theories 
and realistic in its practices, developing theology on 
its metaphysical side and also morality in its personal 
values. Nowhere has doctrinal Christianity been 
more freely discussed and elaborately cultivatecf 
than by the American pulpit; and nowhere in the 
world have the fruits of righteousness been brought 
forth more successfully than by the American laity. 
This land has always cherished the church, the 
college, the theological seminary. It has also pro- 
vided the schoolhouse, the hospital, the laboratory. 
Side by side with the thinker and author stands the 
inventor, the manufacturer. Thus abstract principle 
and practical work have ever gone hand in hand 
through our history. And it is this holy wedlock 
which has made of our country a home of prosperity, 
a parent of new life in the world. We could ask 
nothing better for our future than that the spirit of 
Edwards and of Franklin may never cease to in- 
spire the course of American history. 




THOMAS PAINE 



Thomas Pai 




N the year 1737 a human hfe appeared in 
Europe which was destined to exert a very 
important influence on the early history of 
this nation. In that year Thomas Paine was 
born in England. His father was a Qua- 
ker, a member of the Society of Friends, which 
George Fox brought into prominence in the 
days of the Commonwealth, and which has 
flourished in a limited degree in England ever 
since. The youth was reared in the midst of the 
peculiarly pure and peaceful associations of this or- 
der, and he followed his father in the business of a 
mechanical craftsman. But he early developed a 
thirst for knowledge, a pugnacious disposition, and 
an intellectual activity which dissatisfied him with a 
life of manual toil. He engaged in school-teaching 
and afterward entered the government service as an 
exciseman. 

According to the custom of the day, when author- 
ship was largely confined to the writing of pam- 
phlets on current topics, he soon became known as a 



82 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

writer of considerable ability. He published ar- 
ticles on political reform which commended him to 
the notice of Benjamin Franklin, who was then liv- 
ing in London as the representative of colonial in- 
terests. The wise American, himself a veteran crit- 
ic and reformer, at once recognized in this young 
author a mind of original ability, — shrewd in per- 
ception and fearless in expression, with a radical 
spirit of progressiveness which was just what his own 
people in the New World needed to help them for- 
ward in their political career. So he advised him 
to go to America where, in the simpler society and 
freer air, he would find more congenial conditions 
for his own growth, and a wider field of usefulness. 
There was another reason for this sympathy be- 
tween the old American and the young Englishman. 
Franklin was a free-thinker, although of a mild and 
generous type. From childhood he had abjured 
the tenets of Calvinism, and he had constructed for 
himself in after years a personal religion, consisting 
of belief in the Being and Government of God, and 
of practical morality on the part of man. But while 
rejecting the supernatural element of Christianity, 
he had never been a public advocate of skepticism. 
His New England inheritance of birth and breeding 
had endowed him with an instinctive reverence for 



THOMAS PAINE 83 

religious forms, which kept him all his life on good 
terms with Christianity. 

Thomas Paine was an unbeliever of a more pro- 
nounced sort. His early education had developed 
the spiritual capacities of his nature so as to render 
him peculiarly sensitive to all the evils of religious 
formalism. When therefore he came in contact 
with the Established Church of England, and by 
his official relations was compelled to breathe the at- 
mosphere of a purely ceremonial faith, his moral 
sense revolted. He saw nothing in the ecclesiasti- 
cism of the day but civilized idolatry. The crit- 
icisms of Gibbon, Hume, Hobbs and others con- 
vinced him that Reason was against the church. 
The sentimental theories of Rousseau, and the sharp 
strictures of Voltaire, inflamed his heart with a crav- 
ing for moral independency. Thus moved, this vig- 
orous thinker and ardent idealist believed that the 
interests of humanity demanded the emancipation 
of the soul from the fetters of Christianity, and he 
devoted himself for life to religious as well as politi- 
cal reform. 

Before we condemn him and his action, however, 
let us remember the provocations of his lot. For it 
cannot be denied that Christianity, as he saw it, well 
deserved the reprobation of honest thinkers and pure 



84 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

moralists. The Church of England was then as 
corrupt as the Government of England was oppres- 
sive. Its clergy were mere place-holders, as a rule, 
whose sermons were but moral homilies, and their 
spiritual influence of the coldest kind. When such 
men as John Wesley and George Whitefield were 
driven into secession from the Establishment by its 
perversion of spiritual truth, we cannot wonder that 
an enthusiast for progress like Thomas Paine should 
go further, and become an avowed infidel. For it 
must be remembered that he had never experienced 
personal regeneration, and therefore knew nothing 
about Christianity as an inward life. 

Thus it came to pass that the calm and wise 
Franklin, whose catholic comprehensiveness em- 
braced all varieties of belief with equal considerate- 
ness, was moved with intellectual and moral sympa- 
thy for this young thinker, who had the courage of 
his convictions and whose ideal was so free and 
bold. It should be borne in mind also that at this 
date Paine had not reached the stage of public and 
fierce opposition to Christianity which he afterward 
occupied. 

Following the advice of Franklin, Thomas Paine 
left his native city and went to the American colo- 
nies, making his home in Philadelphia, in the year 



THOMAS PAINE 85 

1 774, where he at once identified himself, mind and 
heart, with the interests of the new people among 
whom he found himself. And impartial history 
has declared that the coming of Thomas Paine to 
America was one of the most important and useful 
gifts which the Old World ever made to the New. 
For he imparted to the nascent, struggling life of 
colonial independence just that sharp and strong 
impulse which it needed at that particular time. 

He found the elements of a future nation still in 
the embryonic state of scattered and chaotic being. 
Far and wide through the wilderness of a sparsely 
settled country, the inhabitants were groping their 
way blindly toward they knew not what. Conscious 
of political wrongs and commercial grievances, eager 
for some change of government or administration, 
they were still without a common ground to stand 
upon or any definite plan of action. Few of the 
boldest patriots of the day dared to think, much less 
speak, of rebellion against the Crown which they 
feared and hated. Franklin in London, Washing- 
ton in Virginia, and Adams in Boston, were still un- 
certain as to the true duties of the hour. The mass 
of the people were ignorant of their powers, unwill- 
ing to assert their rights, or too apprehensive of the 
possible consequences. It was in fact a crisis of 



86 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

vague and gathering preparation, when Destiny 
waits for some sharp stroke of decision to precipitate 
its results. 

Thomas Paine was the man for the hour. With 
the instinct of genius he saw his occasion and seized 
it firmly and fearlessly. Soon the American public 
began to hear a new voice. Pamphlets appeared 
from time to time in Philadelphia bearing the title 
"Serious Thoughts," and "Common Sense." They 
were written in a plain, vigorous style which every- 
one could understand, and they set forth the prin- 
ciples of political freedom in the most emphatic man- 
ner. That there was but one method of redressing 
American wrongs, and that by severing the bonds 
of subordination to the British Crown; that there 
was but one path to the true future of the American 
colonists, and that by becoming an independent na- 
tion, — this was the message which swept through 
the land. 

Coming from an Englishman and a stranger, it 
had special force with the people, and it is not too 
much to say that it was the most active force at just 
that period which brought about the final decision 
of the masses. Thomas Paine did not originate the 
ideas of the Declaration of Independence, nor even 
develop them. But he certainly helped to precipi- 



THOMAS PAINE 87 

tate the crystalization of American sentiment at 
the crisis of its formation. Without his opportune 
and powerful impulse, the American Revolution 
might have been delayed, if not prevented. 

And he continued to render these services all 
through the war. Serving in the army as a soldier 
his pen still proved to be mightier than the sword. 
He published a series of pamphlets called ''The 
Crisis" of which thirteen in number appeared at 
different times, and thus at just the moments of need 
all the people would hear that brave and strong 
voice lifted in counsel, cheer and leadership; and 
they never failed to respond to its appeal. In the 
dark days of disaster one of these issues was regard- 
ed as so important that it was ordered to be read at 
the head of every regiment in the army for its en- 
couraging effect. He rendered these invaluable ser- 
vices until the attainment of peace, in 1 783, when 
in recognition of his usefulness he was honored by 
being appointed clerk to the Assembly of Pennsyl- 
vania. He also received from Congress a donation 
of $3,000, with a formal recognition of his great 
service to the nation. The state of New York also 
honored him with substantial proofs of favor. He 
was indeed at this time regarded as a great public 
benefactor, whom all men delighted to honor. Nor 



88 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

have subsequent events detracted at all from his 
claims on the national gratitude. Rather do we see 
now more clearly than was possible then, the extent 
of his services to the American people. By his 
writings he sowed the land with the seeds of many 
of its best products. He was the first to urge the 
extension of freedom to the negro as well as the 
white man; the first to advocate a close national 
unity for the different colonies; the first to propose 
international arbitration; the first to denounce duel- 
ing and divorce; the first to plead for kindness to 
animals, a national copyright, and justice to woman. 
In fact a large number of the reforms and im- 
provements which American history has given to the 
world can be traced back to the prolific mind and 
the impulsive spirit of Thomas Paine. And it is 
safe to say that if he had died, or had ceased to 
write, at the close of the Revolutionary period, his 
name would have been shining ever since among the 
brightest benefactors of our land and of the world. 
So it has been said of Benedict Arnold that if he 
had perished at the battle of Saratoga, he would 
have been immortalized as the most brilliant soldier 
of the Continental army. But he lived, — lived to 
find that life may be worse than death. 



THOMAS PAINE 89 

What then was it that has so obscured the lustre 
of his memory that now few Americans ever think 
of "Tom Paine" without an impulse of execration? 
The answer to this question is found in the second 
part of his strange and adventurous career. After 
the establishment of American Independence, he re- 
turned to England and found himself at once in- 
volved in the new agitation which preceded and pre- 
pared for the outbreak of the French Revolution. 
He was of an ardent temperament and a vigorous 
mental habit which could not long endure repose 
of any kind, and as public opinion in France and 
England had begun to be affected by the revolution- 
ary ideas imported from America, he entered heart- 
ily into the new crusade, naturally supposing that 
he could be as successful as a champion in the Old 
World as in the New. But his published book. 
The Rights of Man, only procured for him the hos- 
tility of the English government and his exile from 
his native land. Going to France, he was at first 
warmly welcomed as "the friend of liberty." Join- 
ing the ranks of the Girondists, he advocated the 
policy of a mild and reasonable revolution. This 
brought on him the enmity of the Jacobins, by whom 
he was imprisoned when they came into power. 
During the dreadful excesses of the Reign of Ter- 



90 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

ror he was in extreme peril; and he only escaped 
the guillotine by the fall of Robespierre. These 
reverses proved to be not only a physical but a moral 
trial which Paine found it hard to bear. Deprived 
of liberty, defeated in his honest endeavor to en- 
lighten and direct the public, he was thrown back 
upon his own inner life, and that proved to be not 
the friend but the foe of his fame. 

For adversity did not reveal to him what it 
brought to Bunyan in his captivity, to Milton in his 
blindness, to Edwards in his exile, — the comforts 
and compensations of Divine Providence. Thomas 
Paine had no faith in a personal experience of the 
Holy Spirit. Instead, his heart was filled with a 
bitter hatred for that religion which he identified 
with the government that he hated; and it was with 
that impulse and spirit that he entered upon a new 
crusade. 

He was a born polemic. Naturally frank and 
fearless, his entire life had been spent on the battle- 
field of contending principles and policies. He was 
not happy, in fact, unless he was defending or as- 
saulting something. Accordingly he devoted his 
enforced inactivity in Paris to the composition and 
publication of a work. The Age of Reason, in 
which he inaugurated a new crusade against Chris- 



THOMAS PAINE 91 

tianity. Published in England, it became immense- 
ly popular with the multitude who were discon- 
tented with the abuses and tyranny of the Establish- 
ed Church. Reissued in this country, it awoke and 
developed all the skeptical influences which Frank- 
lin's Deism and the French alliance had engendered 
in the new nation. It must be remembered that at 
that time the name of Thomas Paine was honored 
throughout the land as one of the champions of lib- 
erty. Everyone thought well and spoke well of the 
gallant Englishman who had come to the rescue of 
the colonies in their darkest hour, and fought so 
good a fight in their behalf. This prestige there- 
fore naturally recommended his book to the popular 
mind, and gave it a power which it would not have 
had otherwise. It is hardly possible to overestimate 
that power. Coming to a new nation in its youth, 
when the people were in a plastic state of public 
opinion, just forming their habits of collective 
thought, the Age of Reason had a tremendous in- 
fluence, and of the most baleful kind. Its violence 
and coarseness, the sharpness and brightness of its 
arguments and attacks, rendered it an easy and agree- 
able book for the common people to read. And 
they did read it. Widely and with avidity it was 
absorbed by the public mind. Its poison entered 



92 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

into the life of the nation and has been working de- 
structively ever since. No one force has wrought 
the moral harm to the American republic which that 
book has caused. We must rank it as one of the 
greatest curses which has blighted our land; for no 
one can estimate the number of souls ruined and the 
amount of obstruction to Christianity which the Age 
of Reason is accountable for. 

No wonder that the religious spirit of the Amer- 
ican people was so offended by this attack on their 
principles, that organized resistance to Paine and 
has work became a Christian duty. For nearly 
half a century Tom Paine's Age of Reason was the 
target for all the arrows of the pulpit and the relig- 
ious press in this country. The churches, the re- 
ligious public generally, were trained to regard that 
name as the very synonym for all that is false and 
dangerous to the soul of man. For this they have 
been condemned as bigoted, etc., but why so? If 
he had the right to attack, had they not the right to 
defend? He began the battle, and nothing could 
exceed his violence. But it is so still. Let anyone 
impeach the Bible and arraign the church and he 
is lauded as an independent thinker, a critical spirit, 
etc. But as soon as Christians stand by their guns 
and open a return fire, they are narrow, intolerant. 



THOMAS PAINE 93 

illiberal. But is battle a one-sided privilege? If 
there is attack, may there not also be defense? 

And thus the apostle of error brought upon him- 
self the punishment which he deserved. All his 
great services to the cause of liberty were forgotten. 
His name was branded with an infamy that has 
blackened it to this day. Probably very few of the 
Christian people of the United States ever think of 
him now with any feeling but that of moral indigna- 
tion. Even before his death he began to reap this 
sad harvest. Escaping from France he returned to 
this country, hoping to find here an asylum for his 
last years. But he was disappointed. His book 
had made as many enemies for him as it had awaken- 
ed friends. The better classes all held aloof and 
would have nothing more to do with the discipline 
of Voltaire. He became a lonely, hopeless, mel- 
ancholy man. The brand of Cain was on him. 
His last days were spent in poverty and sorrow. 
Conflicting reports have been preserved about the 
incidents of his death, but there is no need to insist 
upon any special aggravation of his miserable end. 

He died friendless and alone, abandoned of God 
and man. Even his bones could not rest in Amer- 
ican soil: transferred years afterwards to England 
they were rejected there by public sentiment and no 



94 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

one now knows the place of his sepulture. Until 
recently no monument, no sepulchre, no grave ever 
bore the name of Thomas Paine. 

So perished the once brilliant favorite of the new 
nation which he had helped to found. In such a 
gloom of final condemnation expired the light which 
Genius had kindled to guide the steps of American 
Liberty to its glorious triumph. 

The story of this eventful life, which began so 
brightly and ended in such great darkness, suggests 
certain lessons which deserve to be heeded. 

1 . We are taught the alarming truth thai the 
friends of Christianity are sometimes responsible for 
the development of its enemies. 

It is certain that the skepticism of Thomas Paine 
was occasioned at the start by the shams and frauds 
in the name of religion which he saw in the Establish- 
ed Church of England. It was the heartless form- 
alism, there paraded as Christianity, which so of- 
fended his sensitive spirit, trained in the pure simplic- 
ity of the Quaker faith, as to drive it to the extreme 
of disbelief in all Christian doctrines. This was, 
of course, unreasonable on his part; nor can he be 
held unaccountable for his infidelity because of the 
hypocrisy of the church with which he came in con- 
tact. His writings remain to show that he was a dili- 



THOMAS PAINE 95 

gent reader of the Bible, in which he might have 
found, he did find, Divine Truth in its purity and 
power. And so he is without excuse. 

Nevertheless, the fact remains that but for the 
unworthy lives of professors of religion, he might 
not have been repelled in the first instance from the 
faith in which he had been reared. This is an ob- 
servation which ought to sink deep into the hearts 
of all Christians, for it has been paralleled in every 
age of religious history. It is a dreadful but un- 
doubted fact that a great part of the opposition to 
the Gospel in this world has been caused by the 
misrepresentation of that Gospel at the hands of its 
advocates. Infidels are being made all the time by 
this cause. Think of the Thomas Paines of today, 
— young minds, eager, bold and insistent truth-seek- 
ers : they want truth and righteousness, but they care 
nothing for tradition. They are impatient of form- 
alism, they despise pretense. They ask for right- 
eousness in the shape of reality. What do they 
hear in our sermons? What do they find in our 
churches? Heaven help us! for we are attracting 
or repelling all the time. 

2. We observe the inevitable groivth of infidel- 
itv on the part of those Tvho indulge in it. Thomas 
Paine began with only intellectual objections to what 



96 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

he regarded as the errors of the Christian scheme. 
He was not an utter opponent of all the truths of the 
Bible. He tried to discriminate between the true 
and the false in the Bible. He claimed to be the 
emancipater of humanity from superstition. It was 
his aim to sift the chaff from the wheat and give to 
humanity a pure religion of simple morality and eth- 
ical wisdom. 

But he was drawn into a current of conflict which 
soon swept him away to extremes of which he did 
not dream at first. Renouncing the cardinal truths 
of Revelation, he lost hold at last of all its virtues, 
and became a fierce iconoclast, bitter and destruc- 
tive. With Franklin, free-thinking was a philosoph- 
ical exercise, perfectly consistent with respect for 
religion. In his hands skepticism was safe and re- 
spectable. But when he invited Paine to America 
he let loose a destructive force upon his native land; 
for Paine's infidelity was positive and aggressive. 
It should be stated that Franklin strongly urged 
Paine not to publish his attacks on Christianity, fore- 
telling the harm to himself and others which would 
result. But his advice was not heeded. He found 
that he could not check the torrent he had liberated. 

A lesson this to be heeded by those who are re- 
peating his mistake today. Those who now insist 



THOMAS PAINE 97 

on rejecting the supernatural element of the Bible, 
and confining themselves to the cultivation of pure 
morals alone, should learn that we cannot have the 
fruits of religion w^ithout cultivating its roots. Chris- 
tianity without Christ is a body without a heart. 
Subtract spiritual grace from human experience and 
you send a ship to sea without rudder or chart. 
The beginnings of error may be small but the end 
thereof is great. The doubt of one age is the denial 
of the next. Skepticism in the parent becomes Ath- 
eism in the child. So with the individual unbeliever. 
Error like Truth is sure to grow. Many a person 
is now beginning with rational objections to Christian 
doctrines who will, if he pause not, end with bitter 
hatred for all revealed religion. It is the logic of 
error, which leads from bad to worse, down all the 
grades of doubt and unbelief to everlasting death. 

3. We are taught the solemn truth that great 
usefulness to humanit]) may consist with enmity to- 
ward Cod. 

It is no final evidence that a person is right mor- 
ally who is sound politically, nor is a wise head al- 
ways proof of a pure heart. It is beyond question 
that one of the most successful champions of liberty 
in the New World was at the same time a victim and 
a servant of Error. This ought not to obscure to 



98 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

our eyes the value of his services. History should 
never let the name of Thomas Paine die, for the 
good that he wrought in the time of our nation's 
need. But on the other hand the purity and vigor 
of his devotion to the cause of political freedom 
ought not to atone for his enmity to the cause of 
moral truth. Efforts are now being made to revive 
his memory and rehabilitate his fame, by those who 
insist that Paine the infidel should be forgotten in our 
gratitude to Paine the Patriot. But it will not do. 
Impartial history reminds us that Paine did his ut- 
most to subject the young nation to a far worse 
tyranny than that of the British Crown. To him 
we owe the tares and thistles of evil which are 
still infesting the harvest fields of America. Irre- 
ligion, immorality, criminal tendencies without end, 
are still flourishing as the baleful products of the 
Age of Reason. 

4. Let Americans never forget this painful pic- 
ture of the personal results of religious unbelief. 

There was a time when no name shone more 
brightly in the esteem of our people than the 
name of Thomas Paine. He was ranked by them, 
and with reason, in the galaxy of noble men who 
clustered about the central sovereign form of Wash- 
ington. Franklin, the wise counselor; Greene, 



THOMAS PAINE 99 

Knox, and Schuyler, the brave soldiers; Lafayette 
and Steuben, the noble allies from Europe; Hamil- 
ton, the shrewd organizer; Morris, the generous fin- 
ancier; Jefferson, the able statesman, were not 
more well known and revered than was Paine, the 
writer, with his sharp and patriotic pen. And so 
it might have been to this day. We should now be 
revering his memory and perpetuating his fame to 
future generations with gratitude and praise but for 
the fact that he tried to make this nation an infidel 
people. That one fact has overturned his monu- 
ment, blackened his reputation, and consigned his 
name to infamy forever. 

Does then infidelity pay? Is it, on the low 
ground of personal interest, worth one's while to 
serve Error rather than Truth? Look through his- 
tory and study the final awards of time. Can you 
find an instance of an atheist or an unbeliever achiev- 
ing immortal honor because of his atheism or unbe- 
lief? They have reaped temporary triumphs by 
their opposition to the truth, as the Pharisees and 
Scribes, Pilate and Felix, did of old. They have 
also in some instances been employed in the service 
of philanthropy, as Parker, Ingersoll, and Paine 
have been. But was it their opposition to Christianity 
which made them philanthropists? In the far fu- 



100 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

ture it will be only what they did for Truth itself 
which will keep their memory green. And now, 
when it is regarded as scientific to deny the supernat- 
ural authority of the Scriptures, philosophical to dis- 
pute the reality of prayer and Providence, intellec- 
tual to question the reality of the atonement and 
the mission of the Holy Spirit, wise to prefer moral- 
ity to religion, and progressive to outgrow the church 
and its creeds, — when multitudes of the young and 
ambitious are entering these paths that promise so 
plausibly, — Tvould that the}^ might heed the Jvarn- 
ings of history! 

5. Finally. — The Vitality of the Truth. 

How often has the Bible been defeated and de- 
stroyed! From the times of Lucian in the second 
century, Celsus in the third, Porphyry in the fourth, 
down to Bolingbroke and Semler in the eighteenth, 
and Strauss and Renan in the nineteenth, every age 
has witnessed an attack on Christianity claiming to 
be triumphant. Yet the tide recedes, leaving the 
coast line the same; the clouds depart, and the stars 
are shining still. 

Thomas Paine verily thought that he had put an 
end to the authority of the Bible; but he died, and 
the Bible survived him. Charles Bradlaugh, in 
England, boasted that he had proved God not to 



THOMAS PAINE 101 

exist; but he passed away, and the Eternal One is 
still on the throne. Robert Ingersoll was not long 
ago rampant as the champion of infidelity; but he, 
too, has vanished, and we have almost forgotten that 
such a man ever lived. So it has been, is, and will 
be to the end. Error and errorists will rise, flourish 
and pass away. But "He that sitteth in the Heaven 
shall laugh! The Lord shall hold them in deri- 
sion!" For deeper than the foundations of the 
earth, and loftier than the dome of the midnight 
sky, and broader than the horizon of the ocean is 
that Divine Truth of which the Bible is only one of 
its many voices. 

'*The grass ipiihereth, the flower fadeth; but the 
Word of our Cod shall Stand forever " 



Benedict Arnold 




N the town of Norwich, Connecticut, on 
every Thanksgiving night, large bonfires are 
kindled on every hilltop as a means of cele- 
brating the day. This peculiar custom is 
more than a hundred years old. Tradition says that 
it can be traced back to the middle of the eighteenth 
century, when it had its beginning in the adventurous 
spirit of a boy who was then the ring-leader of his 
class in the village. 

His name was Benedict Arnold, — a son of an 
honored family in the colony. He was born in 
1741, his father being a prominent merchant and 
public man, and his mother a woman distinguished 
for her good sense and strong religious character. 
This boy grew up in the quiet provincial town, and 
soon became known for peculiar qualities. Strong 
in person, athletic and daring, he was a leader in 
all sports and adventures. Afraid of nothing, brave 
to rashness, the excitement of danger had for him 
an irresistible charm. He was foremost in every 
exploit, especially in such as were lawless and for- 
bidden. The strict Puritanic morality of those days 



104 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

had for him no sanctity. He deHghted in startling 
the good people with irreverent pranks; and it was 
for this purpose that he devised a plan of signalizing 
Thanksgiving night with an illumination, a practice 
which remains in Norwich to this day. 

Young Arnold was thus renowned for a spirit 
which early marked him out for some kind of a prom- 
inent career. He could do nothing in a quiet or 
commonplace way. A natural commander, active, 
ambitious, of keen mind and resolute will, he was 
sure to make his mark in public for good or for ill. 
Everyone respected or feared him, but few loved 
him ; for he was haughty and irascible in temper, gen- 
erous to his friends, but implacable and revengeful 
toward all who offended him. He was a champion 
of the weak, always ready to defend those smaller 
than himself, and capable of great self-sacrifice in his 
devotion to a cause that he believed in; but he was 
over sensitive to reproach and he never forgave an 
injury. Such a spirit would as a matter of course 
easily absorb the rising element of independence 
which was then beginning to be felt in the colonies, 
toward the claims of the British Crown. Arnold's 
inflammable nature waited like tinder for a spark in 
its readiness for the explosive moment. At the age 
of twenty-one he removed to New Haven, where 



BENEDICT ARNOLD 105 

he established himself in business as a druggist and 
book-seller. This peaceful pursuit made him for 
a time a citizen of quiet habits and well ordered 
life. He was in good repute with his townsmen as 
an intelligent and industrious man of affairs. He 
married well and enjoyed a pleasant home and a 
large social connection. 

But the soldier was lurking beneath a civilian's 
garb, and at the first sign of the revolutionary con- 
flict he sprang to arms. On the very day that the 
news of Lexington reached New Haven, April 
twentieth, 1 775, Benedict Arnold summoned his 
company of militia, hastily and forcibly secured arms 
and equipment for them, and at once marched at 
their head to Cambridge, Massachusetts, where he 
offered his services to the Continental cause. 
His company was the first well drilled and reg- 
ular body of troops which appeared on the patriotic 
side ; and their martial appearance was so impressive 
that Arnold immediately became a man of note 
among the American officers. Throwing himself 
with characteristic energy into the new enterprise, 
his bold and comprehensive mind took a military 
view of the general situation. Looking over the 
field at large, he saw the importance in a strategic 
sense of Ticonderoga and Crown Point, positions 



106 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

which the British held as means of communication 
between Canada and New York. He urged an 
expedition for their capture, and his proposition was 
adopted by the authorities. 

He was commissioned as Colonel, and provided 
with a force for the reduction of the fortresses. He 
started as soon as possible, but found on drawing 
near the field of operation that Ethan Allen, of Ver- 
mont, had organized an expedition for the same pur- 
pose. Allen had therefore the precedence, (or he 
assumed it) and Arnold was compelled to serve un- 
der him. But their joint campaign was successful, 
and lakes George and Champlain were freed from 
the enemies of the patriot cause. 

This was the beginning of Arnold's public ser- 
vices. From this time on he was the most enter- 
prising and bold of the American leaders. The 
expedition to Canada for the capture of Quebec 
was suggested and carried out by him. It was by 
far the most daring and brilliant operation of the 
Revolutionary War. Had it succeeded, the Brit- 
ish arms would have been crippled at the beginning 
of the contest, and the entire course of American 
history would have been changed. As a military 
campaign it has been ranked with such events as 
Hannibal's crossing the Alps, and the invasion of 



BENEDICT ARNOLD 107 

Mexico by Cortez, — a prodigy of war. Although 
unsuccessful, the campaign was one of the most re- 
markable for heroic endurance and achievement 
which the annals of American warfare record. Ar- 
nold was from first to last the foremost leader of the 
gallant but ill-fated enterprise. We next see him 
in a naval battle on Lake Champlain, where with a 
small and poorly equipped fleet of vessels he with- 
stood a large force of the enemy with desperate 
courage for a long time. Again he was compelled 
to retreat, but he did so with such glory as to merit 
and receive the applause of the whole country. At 
this time the name of General Arnold was probably 
the brightest star in the public esteem after that of 
General Washington. Everyone saw in him a de- 
voted patriot, a brave soldier, and a skillful officer. 
But at this point his troubles began. Certain ir- 
regularities in the confused and difficult transactions 
of his Canadian campaign had rendered him sub- 
ject to a Court Martial (by which he was substan- 
tially vindicated.) But this and other things brought 
him into collision with certain officers, toward whom 
his native infirmity of temper showed itself offensive- 
ly. He was at all times irascible, impetuous and 
implacable. With all his high-minded courage and 
frank generosity, he could not forgive an injury 



108 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

or conciliate a foe. Sensitive and vain, as brave 
men often are, he felt and resented fiercely every 
slight upon his reputation. Such a man was sure 
to arouse enemies by the very successes that gave 
him notoriety. And in the jealous and irritable 
state of the colonies, then working together for the 
first time, it was easy to develop hostility in Congress 
against a new hero of the hour. So when the first 
Major Generals were commissioned, in 1 777, the 
name of Benedict Arnold was not on the list. Oth- 
er and inferior men were promoted over him. This 
was an unjust and cruel disregard of his great claims 
to the honors of the Government. As such it was 
bitterly denounced by his pround and vengeful 
heart. Arnold never got over this triumph of his 
enemies. It rankled in his mind, a festering cause 
of hatred, until it became one of the elements of his 
ruin in after days. 

But he did not allow this indignity to arrest his 
patriotism at the time. Although wounded and 
weak from the Canadian campaign, he took the field 
again when his state was invaded, and he showed 
such conspicuous courage and skill in repelling the 
invader that Congress was compelled to make repar- 
ation for its neglect by promoting him to the rank of 
Major General, with a formal vote of thanks. And 



BENEDICT ARNOLD 109 

soon followed the crowning event of his patriotic 
career. When the great invasion of Burgoyne was 
threatening the heart of the country, Arnold was 
without a command and was still exposed to the 
machinations of his enemies, of whom there were 
always some, thanks to his irascible temper. But 
he would let nothing stand in the way of his patriot- 
ism, and he showed his devotion by volunteering to 
serve under those who were really his juniors in 
rank. This is the greatest sacrifice which a military 
man can make. For soldiers are always peculiarly 
and justly sensitive with respect to the rights of their 
official grade, as was often shown in the late war. 
But Arnold rose above all personal interests. Un- 
invited and uncommissioned he volunteered for any 
service he could render at that critical time. As he 
wrote : "No public or private injury shall prevail on 
me to forsake the cause of my oppressed country 
until I see peace and liberty restored to her, or die 
in the attempt." 

It was in this spirit and attitude that he took part 
in the great campaign. After distinguishing him- 
self by the relief of Fort Stanwix, he was prominent 
in the decisive battle of Saratoga. That splendid 
victory was won in the strangest manner. General 
Schuyler, who had so ably commanded the army 



no STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

during its retreat before Burgoyne, and who was ful- 
ly competent to lead it, was, through conspiracies in 
Congress, displaced by General Gates, an inferior 
and ill-deserving officer. In his feeble hands the 
army would have been sacrificed and certain defeat 
would have ensued, but for the energy and skill of 
his subordinates. It was the fiery courage of Ar- 
nold in particular that turned the tide at Saratoga. 
While Gates was loitering in his tent at the rear, 
this dashing soldier was at the front, where, con- 
trary to orders, he won the day by his desperate 
valor. The whole army looked to him and follow- 
ed him as its inspiring head, and historians now unite 
in ascribing to his splendid leadership the chief glory 
of that decisive triumph. In the hour of carnage 
Arnold fell, wounded again as at Quebec. As he 
lay bleeding on the ground an American soldier 
rushed forward and would have killed the Hessian 
who fired the shot. But the General protested, 
"Don't hurt him! he did but his duty; he is a fine 
fellow." This was an act of knightly spirit. It 
showed the true chivalry of the gallant warrior; 
and as the conqueror won that moral victory he 
reached the climax of his career. 

It has been well said that this was the time for 
Benedict Arnold to die. If he had perished then 



BENEDICT ARNOLD 1 1 1 

and there, he would have left a name which his 
country would have haloed with unfading praise. 
But Death did not come to save his name and en- 
shrine it with immortal honor. Life came instead, 
to spare him for a future such as few mortals have 
had cause to deplore. 

For with the crowning service and glory of Ar- 
nold's life came the hour of his deadly trial. He 
received the well-deserved thanks of Congress and 
the personal plaudits of Washington. In consid- 
eration of his wounds and services he was given the 
eminent honor of commanding at Philadelphia, then 
the most important post of the colonies. Here, after 
the death of his first wife, he married again in the 
most select ranks of society, and became thus a dis- 
tinguished member of the military and social life 
of the place. There we see him in the pride of his 
great success, the most famous soldier of his time, the 
most popular man of his day. What more could 
human ambition ask for? 

But the shadows were already beginning to gather 
on his horizon. The enemies, whom his brilliant 
deeds had only offended the more, began to renew 
their private attacks on his record in Congress, and 
were successful in bringing upon him many indigni- 
ties under the forms of law which exasperated his 



112 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

proud and vengeful spirit. It is almost incredible, 
but the fact remains that the Executive Council of 
the state of Pennsylvania, preferred charges against 
him for trivial technical irregularities of administra- 
tion. A Court Martial was ordered by Congress, 
by which he was acquitted on most of the charges, 
but was sentenced to receive a reprimand by the 
Commander-in-Chief for indiscretion of conduct. 
This was done by Washington, as kindly as possi- 
ble, but the public disgrace fell with crushing weight 
upon the proud-spirited soldier. That he, the hero 
of three campaigns, the most popular fighting man 
of the army, should be thus humiliated, was an in- 
dignity never to be forgotten or forgiven. He was 
also ostentatious and extravagant in his style of liv- 
ing, and soon became painfully involved in debt. 
But worse still, his new social relations had placed 
him in the midst of a disloyal element, which was 
then very strong among the old and rich families 
of the city. Arnold heard from them continual crit- 
icism of the Colonial cause, and praise of the royal 
government. He heard the mistakes and weakness 
of Congress perpetually exposed and emphasized. 
He heard his own wrongs pitied and his enemies 
condemned. And thus his mind was subtly filled 
with disparaging and darkening thoughts. Removed 



BENEDICT ARNOLD 1 1 3 

from the healthful excitements of the battle-field 
and the hardships of war, which had furnished a 
safety-vent for his passionate nature, he found in 
the luxurious habits of garrison life space for perilous 
broodings and corrupt moral suggestions. Always 
destitute of religious principles, and peculiarly liable 
to the blandishments of pride and self-indulgence, 
he became relaxed in his patriotism and, ere he knew 
it, open to seductive influences. 

Just at this time, moreover, the state of public 
affairs was rapidly becoming desperate. Notwith- 
standing the victory of Saratoga the Colonial cause 
seemed to decline with fearful rapidity. The col- 
onists had no coherence or harmony. The Conti- 
nental Congress was filled with jealous and conflict- 
ing factions. Even Washington was conspired 
against. The paper currency had no value. The 
army was ill-paid, poorly equipped, and at times on 
the verge of mutiny. It is a fact not generally 
known to American patriots at the present time that 
of the three millions of people composing the col- 
onists, during the Revolution, at least one million 
were Tories (Loyalists) openly or at heart. This 
negative element in the population always had a 
very depressing effect on the public sentiment, and 
especially in periods of disaster. There were at 



114 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

one time fully as many Americans under arms in the 
British service as were enlisted in the Continental 
army. The Commander-in-Chief nearly lost his 
confidence. "I have almost ceased to hope," he 
said. All of the patriot leaders were depressed if 
not discouraged. As Thomas Paine wrote in his 
popular pamphlets, "These are the times that try 
men's souls." 

But the greater number of Americans survived 
this trial of faith, because their circumstances com- 
pelled them to adhere to their principles. With Ar- 
nold it was different. His situation was unfavora- 
ble to patriotic consistency. Insulted and outraged, 
as he believed, by the government that he had suf- 
fered so much to defend, in the midst of the ener- 
vating influence of luxury, and surrounded by dis- 
loyal people who filled his ears with British senti- 
ments, he was far removed from a true American's 
vantage ground. He was indeed within the enemy's 
lines. But he was approached at first in no dis- 
honorable manner. His nobler principles were 
appealed to. It was argued by his Tory friends 
that genuine patriotism now advised a change on 
his part. He had done all that self-sacrifice could 
demand of him for his country. His comrades had 
suffered to extremity, and what was the result? 



BENEDICT ARNOLD 115 

Nothing but unprofitable bloodshed, universal de- 
struction, and a hopelessly ruined cause. Why not 
then stop this mad and useless war? In the name 
of ruined homes, and bleeding hearts, and prostrate 
business, why not put an end to the hopeless con- 
flict? "The Crown is now willing to grant all that 
the colonies demanded. There shall be no taxation 
without representation; every grievance shall be 
redressed; the colonies shall be self-governing, in 
deference to the Home Government, and all will be 
peaceful and prosperous again." 

Such was the alluring picture held before the eyes 
of the sore-hearted soldier. And when his sense of 
honor revolted, as it did, and he protested against 
the shame of treason, he was reminded of great his- 
toric precedents for the course in question. Did not 
General Monk forsake the cause of the Common- 
wealth and with his army restore England to the 
Monarchy? Did not the Duke of Marlboro (Brit- 
ain's most famous soldier) abandon King James and 
help to establish the new dynasty of William? Yet 
no one ever condemned them for their change of al- 
legiance. They were praised and honored for the 
blessed results of their defection. "And so will you 
be. General Arnold. After the temporary pain of 
the discomfiture has passed, and the benign effects 



116 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

of restored peace and harmony are enjoyed, all true 
patriots will applaud the man who could rise super- 
ior to the clamor of partisanship and do what no one 
else could do for the general good." Such were the 
arguments of the tempter; and however false and 
feeble they seem to us now, the impartial critic who 
will go back and put himself in the place of Benedict 
Arnold then and there, will be forced to admit that 
they must have sounded plausible and powerful in 
his ears. Recall his situation — his personal griev- 
ances, his unfavorable associations, and the desperate 
state of public affairs just then, and anyone can see 
that a crisis had come when a wavering mind might 
be easily turned by such considerations as were pre- 
sented to him. 

Such was the result. He yielded to the argu- 
ments addressed to him and accepted the proposition 
that he should make use of his official position to re- 
store the colonies to the British Crown. What his 
real motives were will always be a matter of conjec- 
ture. Doubtless they were many and mixed. He 
was not a sordid or a selfish man, and money and 
fame could not have been his main object. But he 
had an implacable, vengeful spirit, and this must 
have helped him to decide against his country. Yet 
it is equally probable that he really thought that rea- 



BENEDICT ARNOLD 1 1 7 

son and right counseled his course, for the ultimate 
good of the colonies. To the end of his life he af- 
firmed, often emphatically, "I believed our cause 
was hopeless. I thought we never could succeed 
and I did it to save the shedding of blood." 

So now we must turn the page of history to that 
dark story, which seems all the blacker because of 
the bright record which had gone before. Let the 
tale be told as briefly as possible: — it is too well 
known to all Americans. General Arnold, after 
yielding to the persuasion of the Tories, opens a 
clandestine correspondence with the British Author- 
ities. He receives from them formal proffers of co- 
operation and reward. In accordance with their 
suggestions he asks for and obtains from Washington 
(who was anxious to do anything that could soothe 
the feelings of so highly prized an officer) the com- 
mand of West Point, the most important military 
post in the colonies. There he makes deliberate 
preparations to hand over that fortress to the enemy. 
To complete these arrangements he meets Major 
Andre, an English officer, who comes up the river 
in a sloop of war, and in the shadow of night confers 
with Arnold on the shore. 

If that conference had terminated before morning 
Andre would have returned to the vessel, and by 



118 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

it safely to New York, and the plot would have suc- 
ceeded undoubtedly. But detained until daybreak, 
he is forced to remain in concealment until the next 
night, and then finds that the vessel has dropped 
further down the stream. This renders it necessary 
for him to go back by land. He starts, with the pass 
of General Arnold to guarantee his safety, and this 
conveys him through the American lines until he 
regards himself secure. But at the last moment he 
is stopped by strangers whom he does not recognize 
as Continentals, and to whom he reveals his rank, 
supposing them to be friends. Then follows his 
arrest and search, and the discovery of the papers on 
his person. Thus by a chain of unintended and 
unexpected events, a carefully prepared conspiracy 
is brought to light. Tidings of the arrest are at once 
sent back to West Point. Arnold learns with hor- 
ror of the sudden revelation, and without a moment's 
delay flees to the British protection. Nor any too 
soon ; a little delay and he would have been arrested. 
Washington arrives from a tour of inspection just 
in time to receive the astounding news, and to ex- 
claim in wondering sorrow, "Whom can we trust 
now? 

The awful intelligence flies far and wide. It rolls 
like a thunder storm through the land. Major Cen- 



BENEDICT ARNOLD 1 19 

eral Arnold a traitor! The army stands aghast, 
the people are confounded, his enemies exultant. 
Then comes the explosion of popular wrath, and 
from Massachusetts to South Carolina the colonies 
ring and roar with execrations, frenzied and fierce, 
on the name of him who was but yesterday the pride 
of all. In the midst of this wild storm of indignation 
poor Andre meets the just fate which military law 
deals out to him as a party to the shameful transac- 
tion, nor can the special pleading of English advo- 
cates ever successfully impugn the justice of his pun- 
ishment as a spy, however much all must deplore the 
sad misfortune which involved him in the doom 
which another deserved. For again. Death had 
passed Arnold by. Better far for his self-conscious- 
ness that he had perished then, even by a traitor's 
execution, than that he should live, — live on and on, 
for many years, under the unlifting shadow of re- 
morse and black disgrace. For what a plight was 
his! To reach the British lines not as he had ex- 
pected, with the honor of great success, but a mere 
fugitive, covered with the shame of failure and con- 
scious of having left his fellow conspirator behind 
him to die. It would help him in our sight if we 
could see him cowering and sinking beneath this ter- 



120 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

rible burden into well deserved obscurity and ob- 
loquy. 

But Benedict Arnold could not do that. His 
was too strong and bold a spirit to acknowledge it- 
self defeated, even in a bad cause. And it inten- 
sified the popular hatred of him that he at once be- 
gan to vindicate himself and his action by entering 
vigorously into the King's service. Assuming a 
command in the royal army he issued a proclamation 
to his former countrymen full of arguments and 
pleadings to return to their old allegiance. More 
than this, he actually led the red-coated soldiers 
against the Continental buff and blue in two inva- 
sions, carrying destruction and death into the ranks 
that he had once been so proud to lead. No won- 
der that Americans came to think of him and speak 
of him as a prodigy of evil, an infernal incarnation 
of falseness and malignity. Washington could not 
hear his name mentioned without a shudder. Even 
his poor wife and child were not allowed to remain 
in Philadelphia, but were sent away to the British 
lines. The story is told that Congress ordered that 
any soldier in the army bearing the name of 
Arnold should exchange it for some other, 
and this was done by a private from Con- 
necticut, who took the name of Steuben. All the 



BENEDICT ARNOLD 121 

former services of Arnold were forgotten. His pa- 
triotism, his courage and skill, his wounds, were 
hidden behind the black shame of his treason, and 
to this day the popular idea of him remains that of a 
monumental renegade, for whom no curse is too 
bitter, no doom too bad. 

Exiled to England with the defeated army of the 
Crown, he was received with open arms by the King 
and the Court, who honored and rewarded him for 
his so-called fidelity to the true cause. He was 
praised and petted by the aristocracy as a loyalist 
who had suffered for his patriotism. But nothing 
could lift the shadow from Benedict Arnold's brow, 
or the burden from his heart. Never could he for- 
get the glory of that good and gallant past which 
had been his in the days of his integrity. No Eng- 
lish honors could satisfy his sore American heart. 
Nor could any foreign praise atone for the scorn 
and hatred of his own countrymen. Nemesis fol- 
lowed him even across the sea. There was a large 
liberal element in England which refused to recog- 
nize him. He tried to obtain service in the British 
army, but for this reason he was refused. No gov- 
ernment would allow him to draw his sword in its 
behalf. Retiring to private life, he engaged in mer- 
cantile pursuits, but with poor success. His heart 



122 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

could not stoop to such things. He was a soldier 
and nothing else. And as a soldier he suffered 
more than tongue can tell. 

He always insisted, however, that his motives had 
been just at the time of his treason. He lived and 
died trying to make himself and others believe that 
he had been playing the part of a patriot. But no 
such pleading could quench the fire that dieth not in 
his lonely heart. An outlaw from his native land, 
exiled and hated by all he had loved, it was his 
melancholy part to confess to a Frechman who ap- 
plied to him for letters of introduction, "I am the 
only American living who can say, 'I have not one 
friend in America.' No, not one! I am Benedict 
Arnold!" And so the shadow grew darker to the 
end. We know of no more pathetic scene than the 
death of this man, who had fallen from so high a 
position to so low a plight. He had always preserv- 
ed, with military pride, the regimentals which he 
wore as an American General. When he felt the 
last hour approaching, "Bring me," said he, "the 
epaulettes and sword knots which Washington gave 
me. Let me die in my old American uniform, in 
which I fought my battles. God forgive me" he 
sighed, "for ever putting on any other." 



BENEDICT ARNOLD 123 

The lessons taught by this mournful story are 
many and evident. Of them we select a few: 

1. Evil is never wholly unmitigated. There is 
always in human experience something to relieve or 
lighten the darkness of sin. Benedict Arnold was 
not an utterly bad man. Americans should remem- 
ber the first half of his career — his patriotism, his 
self-sacrifice, his heroism, and the splendor of his 
military service. Let not our detestation of his crime 
prevent us from honoring that portion of his life 
which was so precious to his country. It is also 
worthy of note that the family who survived him, 
seven sons and one daughter, always cherished his 
memory with respect and affection. The sons ser- 
ved in the British army with distinction, and some of 
their descendants yet live, all of them persons of 
moral worth and social eminence. It is with them 
a family tradition that their ancestor fell a victim to 
a sense of duty, which, however capable of mis- 
representation and unfortunate in its results, was 
still sincere on his part and was worthy of a better 
fate. 

2. We see that Evil is never a matter of sudden 
and unprepared development. The roots of Ar- 
nold's great error can be traced back through all his 
previous career. His irascible and implacable dis- 



124 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

position, unchecked in youth, the self-conceit which 
could brook no slight and forgive no injury, the 
vanity and extravagance w^hich led into false posi- 
tions, — all these long nurtured qualities were slowly 
wrecking his moral character and unfitting him for 
the hour of trial, long before the temptation came. 
And they teach with painful emphasis the lesson that 
the successes and the failures of life are always the 
natural fruit of its previous growth. We are strong 
or weak in the sudden crisis according to what we 
have been or done before it came. 

3. We cannot help remarking the Plausibility 
of Evil. How many arguments can be adduced in 
favor of its propositions! When we go back and 
put ourselves in the place of Benedict Arnold, we 
are surprised to find how differently his contemplated 
deed appeared before its execution. Then, pure 
patriotism seemed to advise it as an act of mercy to 
a suffering country. The terrible exegencies of a 
failing cause recommended it, and historic precedents 
of the highest character could be cited to justify it. 
That was what Arnold saw. He never dreamed of 
the tremendous consequences of failure, and of the 
after results to himself and his name. In after years 
he always maintained that he had tried to serve his 
country in the way that seemed best to him at the 



BENEDICT ARNOLD 125 

time. But no sinner was ever permitted to see the 
results of sinning. Sin shows its brightest aspects 
first, and these may be of an attractive character. 
There is never lack of arguments in favor of a wrong 
course. Satan is an excellent pleader. He can 
reason well. What promises, what prospects of 
benefit has he opened to human souls, ever since the 
first victims were beguiled in the Garden! Even 
Judas has found his apologists. It is a theory of cer- 
tain critics that his real motive was a mistaken notion 
that he could, or ought to, thus compel his Mas- 
ter to assert his divinity by saving himself from the 
foes whom his disciples brought upon him. Such 
are the "depths of Satan," the wiles of the adver- 
sary, by which he is even now luring men into in- 
temperance, extravagance, dishonesty. He is a liar 
and the father of it, as all his victims discover at 
length. 

4. The cruelt}^ of Evil. It betrays and aban- 
dons all who yield to its advances. Poor Arnold, 
stripped in a day of his honors, hurled down from 
the height of a noble reputation into the abyss of 
shame, condemned to drag through life the ball and 
chain of a felon's doom, — what a picture this of the 
foul treachery of Sin to its victims! Judas, when 
his eyes were opened to the enormity of his crime. 



126 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

hurried back to his employers with the plea, "I have 
sinned, in that I have betrayed innocent blood." 
But they will have nothing to do with him now: 
"What is that to us! See thou to that!" Thus the 
cruelty of Sin, its base and cowardly desertion of 
those whom it has ruined, always crowns its con- 
quests with peculiar infamy. Ought it not, then, to 
be shunned and resisted by us at the start? When 
we see the terrible destructions it has wrought al- 
ready, have we not reason to repel its approach? 
Will you believe this traitor when it tries to draw 
you from duty and disarm you for the right? What 
folly, what suicidal madness, to listen to and accept 
its false proposals! 

5. There is no excuse for treason. The betray- 
al of a trust is an unpardonable crime. After all 
is urged that can be said in extenuation of Benedict 
Arnold's act, it remains a black brand upon the page 
of history which can never be effaced. Had he 
wrongs to be redressed? So had other patriots, 
such as Schuyler, who yet never thought of sacrific- 
ing their country to gratify their own resentment. 
Was the cause of the colonies desperate in his opin- 
ion? But no more than it was to such a man as 
Washington, who in all his forebodings never dream- 
ed of seeking for help through dishonor. Arnold 



BENEDICT ARNOLD 127 

was not the only Continental officer who was ap- 
proached with British gold, and arguments, and 
promises. Why, then, could he not treat the tempt- 
er as others treated him, with brave and persevering 
hopefulness, determined to do and die before they 
yielded? Valley Forge was a trial which showed 
how strong and triumphant a thing American pa- 
triotism could be; and Yorktown at last demon- 
strated that such fidelity was reasonable and right. 
What apology then remains for a traitor whose heart 
failed him at the crisis, whose selfish spite blinded 
him to the truth that others saw, and who thus failed 
when they succeeded in winning the laurels of Time? 
Let everyone remember this in his hour of trial. 
For to each responsible soul it is given to be true or 
false to a trust. There are many kinds of treason. 
One may be a traitor to the Truth which he has 
promised to uphold. One may be a traitor to 
Duty — to the convictions which it urges, or 
the positions which it assigns to him, or the 
professions which it involves. One may be a trait- 
or to Christ and his cause, to God and his word. 
One may be a traitor to himself, to the ideals of his 
better nature, or the resolutions of his purest mo- 
ments. And sooner or later the test will surely be 
applied by the Tempter, who seeks the ruin of us 



128 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

all. Nor can it be denied that honor is often at a 
disadvantage, in the dark days of adversity when 
virtue is a costly thing, and all the apparent bene- 
fits of life are on the opposite side. Not seldom are 
the trials of Arnold repeated among the soldiers of 
Truth. 

Oh, in that hour of keen emergency, v^hen we 
must choose between the severities of Right and the 
blandishments of Wrong, let this tragedy from our 
country's past sound its warning in our ears! Let 
the mournful fate of one of the most distinguished 
American soldiers prevent us from repeating his mis- 
takes and incurring his doom. Ours be the stead- 
fast faith of Washington, the heroic constancy of 
the ragged Continentals, the stern fidelity of patriots 
who could live or die for their country, but never 
forsake it. So may we serve the Master, whose 
emblem is the Cross on earth, and the Crown in 
heaven ! 




AARON BURR 



Aaron Burr and Alexander 
Hamilton 



WHEN the American Revolution opened a 
^^^„^ new chapter in the history of this nation and 
B^i^ this continent, two young men were ready 
to find in it the opportunity of their hves. 
With the hour always comes the man who is ap- 
pointed to use it and be used by it, and 
sometimes there is more than one man. It 
was the age of young men. Both Europe 
and America were beginning to ferment with 
the agitation of new ideas and new forces. Such 
periods of abnormal productivity find in youthful 
spirits their best expression, and they always develop 
precocity of mind and heart. Danton and Robes- 
pierre reached their baleful eminence in France be- 
fore they had passed the meridian of life. Napoleon 
was twenty-seven when he took command of the 
army of Italy, and his future marshals were all young 
men at that time. Charles Fox entered the House 
of Commons at nineteen, and was a member of the 
Ministry at twenty-one. William Pitt was Prime 



130 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY , 

Minister of England at twenty-five. George Wash- 
ington was twenty-three when he first entered the 
military service of the colonies. Aaron Burr and 
Alexander Hamilton were respectively twenty-one 
and twenty years of age when the memorable year 
1 776 aroused the colonies to action. And of all 
the many great and brilliant characters which that 
immortal epoch gave to history, these two men 
were not the least prominent. Their part in the 
Revolutionary era of our history well deserves to be 
studied and remembered. 

Aaron Burr was one of the most highly gifted 
natures this country ever produced, and he came 
near being one of its most eminent and successful 
leaders. Nothing could have been more select and 
fortunate than his derivation and his family position. 
To say that he was the grandson of Jonathan 
Edwards is to locate him in the line of a great and 
good genealogy; for that eminent Christian min- 
ister gave to New England, and through it to this 
nation, the most powerful intellectual and spiritual 
impulse of the colonial period. His daughter was 
the mother of Aaron Burr. She was a woman dis- 
tinguished for rare gifts of person and of mind, an 
ornament of society and the home. Her husband, 
Aaron Burr, was a New England clergyman, of a 



BURR AND HAMILTON 131 

family which had been for three generations cele- 
brated in Church and state for character and useful- 
ness. Not only as a preacher but as a teacher and an 
author he was well known and honored. To him 
the College of New Jersey, afterwards known as 
Princeton, owed the best of its early training. Of 
such an ancestry and in such a home was produced 
the youth whose life we are about to follow. 

Aaron Burr was in many respects worthy of his 
lineage. There are few instances of a nature so 
well endowed with all the graces and powers of 
mental excellence. Left an orphan at an early age 
and reared in the family of his uncle, one of the 
strictest of the Puritans, he early developed a keen 
intellectualism and a remarkable aptitude for learn- 
ing. He was in fact precocious in everything — in 
wit, courage, self-possession, and audacity. Ready 
for college at the age of eleven, but not allowed 
to enter until his thirteenth year, (as sophomore,) 
he was graduated at sixteen, with the reputation of a 
brilliant writer and speaker. But he had already 
shown those traits of intense self-will and pride of 
mind which were destined in after years to lead him 
astray. 

It was at this time that he met the moral crisis of 
his life. A revival of religion took place in the Col- 



132 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

lege of New Jersey during his Senior year, and 
many of the students were deeply impressed by its 
spiritual power. But Aaron Burr could not yield 
his assent to the doctrines then in vogue. It is claim- 
ed by some of his apologists that the acute analyti- 
cal temper which he had inherited from his grand- 
father disposed him to criticise his grandfather's 
theology. 

It has been said that if the Gospel had been pre- 
sented to him in the simplicity and sweetness of its 
original character, it might have found and moved 
his heart. But identified as it then was with meta- 
physical abstractions and polemics, it aroused his 
combativeness. Probably because he was Jonathan 
Edward's descendant he was provoked by his philo- 
sophy, according to the well known principle in 
nature that one extreme is followed by its opposite. 
Consulting President Witherspoon, he was advis- 
ed by him not to yield to the religious interest of 
the hour, which was described as a mere temporary 
and superficial excitement ; and so the great occasion 
passed by, leaving Aaron Burr a confirmed unbe- 
liever. What a critical moment! Such as has often 
come to awakened souls ! For whatever may be 
said in exception to the prevailing theology of the 
lime, there can be no doubt that the Spirit of God 



BURR AND HAMILTON 133 

was then moving on the face of the deep. Those 
revivals of religion were genuine opportunities of 
grace; and if Aaron Burr had yielded to the Holy 
Spirit's urgency, he would have lived a very different 
and far more happy and useful life. 

But it was an age of infidelity when opposition 
to christian truth was fashionable in learned circles. 
In Europe, Voltaire and Rousseau had made skep- 
ticism popular; and Gibbon, Hobbs, and Boling- 
broke had leavened English thought with doubt and 
self-will. Lord Chesterfield was one of the most 
influential writers of this school. He advocated 
a religion of good manners, fine culture, and moral 
indifferentism. According to his theory, refined self- 
indulgence was the only true aim, and a due regard 
for appearances the one rule of life. This became 
the gospel of Aaron Burr. It was well fitted to 
his character, in which self-reliance was always the 
leading element. Graceful in person, of a pecu- 
liarly winning and powerful address, witty, accom- 
plished and urbane, he was always a favorite in 
society. He could adapt himself to any circum- 
stances, and was a natural leader of men. Generous 
to a fault, sympathetic and helpful, he was a good 
husband, a loving father and a devoted friend. At 
the same time, he was notoriously lax in morals. 



134 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

and unscrupulous in his pursuit of personal ends. 
Indeed, taking his career as a whole, it seems to be 
an extraordinary illustration of what intellect, will, 
and affection can do, without an active conscience. 
Despite the advantages of a godly parentage and 
the most careful religious training, Aaron Burr 
never showed the slightest regard for the law of 
God or the work of Christ. He was, practically, 
as much an atheist as though born and bred in Paris, 
although he professed a reverence for some parts of 
the Bible, and was always respectful toward the 
religious beliefs of others. But he was not at all 
the selfish voluptuary or the reckless debauchee 
which popular indignation afterwards held him to be. 
On the contrary, he was an earnest, painstaking man 
of affairs, whose life was filled with intelligent indus- 
try. As a patriot, he made a brilliant record in the 
Revolutionary War. Serving under Arnold in his des- 
perate Canada campaign, this short, slim youth 
achieved a noble reputation for courage, endurance 
and skill; and afterwards in the Continental Army 
he was distinguished for military efficiency and de- 
votion. Washington recognized and honored his 
ability while, with his infallible judgment of char- 
acter, he distrusted him personally. Aaron Burr 
reciprocated by always undervaluing the great 



BURR AND HAMILTON 135 

leader. He thought Washington a dull, slow man, 
with an accidental eminence of position. But it is 
certain that if Burr, Benedict Arnold and Thomas 
Paine had perished in the midst of the seven years' 
war they would have been renowned to this day 
as gallant and useful patriots. 

Returning to civil life, Aaron Burr devoted him- 
self to the legal profession, and with his usual suc- 
cess. He rapidly rose to the front rank in the New 
York Bar and became celebrated for his forensic 
knowledge and ability. He was just the man to 
succeed as a lawyer. Keen, bold and versatile, tire- 
less in his study of cases, adroit in his management 
of them, and of a commanding influence with men, 
it is said that he never lost a case that he had de- 
voted himself to. The same good fortune followed 
him in the field of politics. Such was his genius 
for organization and intrigue, his grasping ambi- 
tion, and indomitable force of character, that every- 
thing gave way before him. In four years after 
entering the political arena he had become a mem- 
ber of the State Legislature, next of the National 
Senate, then Vice-President, and finally had en- 
tered into competition with Washington, Jefferson, 
Adams and Clinton for the Presidency itself. He 
came within one electoral vote of reaching the high- 



136 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

est position in the land. All this before the age of 
thirty-six. 

Such a career is without a parallel in our history. 
It is safe to say that about the year 1 800 there was 
no man in the United States whose position was more 
eminent in the popular esteem, or whose prospects 
were more brilliant, than those of Aaron Burr. 
The most finished gentleman, accomplished politi- 
cian, and able lawyer in New York — rich, hand- 
some, popular and powerful — he seemed to be a 
favorite of fortune, on his way to a splendid destiny. 
And yet even then he was standing on the edge of 
the long slope of decline which was to lead him at 
last into an abyss of infamy. 

The turning-point of the history of Aaron Burr 
is found in his relations to Alexander Hamilton. 
These two men are inseparably connected in Amer- 
ican history as the actors in one of its most romantic 
and tragic dramas. There was a remarkable par- 
allelism and contrast between them. Both were 
among the young men whom the Revolutionary 
period developed so quickly. Only one year of 
age separated them. They were alike in person — 
slight, active and graceful — and were equally suc- 
cessful in society and at the bar. Both rose quickly 
to office and celebrity, and were at one time re- 



BURR AND HAMILTON 137 

spectively the leaders of great factions in the state. 
But there was a wide remove between them which 
deepened at length into a mortal antagonism. 

Alexander Hamilton was one of the mysteries 
of the Revolutionary period. His life remains to 
this day an enigma which defies complete interpreta- 
tion. So far from possessing the ancestral and cir- 
cumstantial advantages which his great rival pos- 
sessed, Hamilton sprang from an obscure and for- 
eign parentage. Even the date of his birth and 
the names of his parents are matters of some uncer- 
tainty; but it is probable that he was born in the 
West Indies, on the island of Nevis, about January 
11, 1 757, of a Scotch father and a French mother. 
Little is known of his early years or his intellectual 
and moral environment, until the age of fifteen, 
when he appeared in Boston alone and with ap- 
parently small help from friends or fortune. But 
he soon showed himself to be an ardent, ambitious 
youth, bent on making his way through the world. 
He went to New York, then to a school in New 
Jersey, and finally to King's College, in New York 
City, where he began to attract attention for his 
mental precocity and mature character. Like Burr, 
Hamilton was short and slim, but agile, graceful, 
and of a restless, indomitable spirit. The hot blood 



138 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

of the tropics was in his veins, while the cool tem- 
per of Scotland gave him firmness and poise. 
Throughout his life he was noted for this rare com- 
position of excitable passion with keen and strong 
mentality. 

What the little West Indian — he was in no 
sense of American production or character — 
would have been in ordinary times, we have no 
means of determining; but the Revolution awoke 
and developed him on its own lines, as it did so 
many others. On the occasion of a public meeting 
in the fields of New York, when popular orators 
were haranguing the multitude about the new 
crisis and its claims, everyone was surprised to see 
this boy of seventeen emerge from the crowd and 
address the multitude from the platform with all 
the ease and effect of an experienced speaker. He 
was a born orator, always noted for brilliancy of 
thought, fluency of speech, and sympathetic power 
over men. 

From that moment he began to be known as a 
rising figure in the popular esteem. He wrote 
pamphlets in the defense of the cause of the Colo- 
nies against the attacks of the Tories, which were 
widely read and proved to be very useful. At the 
outbreak of hostilities he entered the army, and 



BURR AND HAMILTON 139 

served with such distinction as to attract the atten- 
tion of General Washington, who appointed him 
to a position on his staff. In that capacity he sus- 
tained the most confidential relations to the Com- 
mander-in-Chief during four years. Washington 
was never deceived in his estimates of character; 
and for the same reason that he distrusted the 
brave and skillful Burr on moral grounds, he gave 
his unreserved confidence to the equally bold but 
more stable and well-balanced Hamilton. But it 
was after the war that this young foreigner showed 
his greatest ability and rendered the highest service 
to his adopted country. Adopting the law as his 
profession, he rose rapidly to eminence and became 
noted for his power as a pleader at the bar. Po- 
litical life soon drew him into its arena, and there 
he achieved his greatest success. He was more 
than a politician, serving a party; he became a 
statesman, devoted to the interests of the nation. 

Our country had need of such services at that 
time. Independence brought to the colonies free- 
dom from a foreign yoke, but it found them all 
unprepared for their new position and its possibili- 
ties. They were a group of different and discord- 
ant provinces, between whom there was little in 
common but much to promote friction and discon- 



140 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

tent. Massachusetts feared the dominance of New 
York, which in turn was jealous of Pennsylvania; 
and this, again, resented the leadership of Virginia. 
There was no unity of spirit anywhere. Each of 
the colonies asserted its particular rights and would 
yield little to the other. Not one of them was 
imbued with the idea or impulse of union, now so 
familiar and dear to us; and the prospect was that 
an era of dissension and confusion was about to open 
which might result in anarchy or a reaction toward 
despotism, as so many other revolutions had termi- 
nated. 

At that critical moment — one of the most im- 
portant this country ever saw — Alexander Hamil- 
ton was the only man equal to the occasion. With 
the intuition of genius he saw that the one way out 
of the difficulty was the road which led to Federal 
union — a closely-compact organization of the 
states in an organized nationality. He devoted 
himself to the advocacy of that doctrine and by a 
series of papers known as The Federalist he filled 
the public mind with the idea of Governmental 
Unity. No greater service was ever rendered to 
this country than that which was given by these 
publications. As a discussion of the philosophy 
and practice of government, and as a means to the 



BURR AND HAMILTON 141 

end of the construction of the Federal System, 
which has made this nation what it is, the Feder- 
alist remains a monumental work, which the best 
historians and statesmen have praised ever since. 
That the variant and conflicting group of colonies 
became the United States of America — a unified, 
compact and enduring nation — is largely due to the 
foresight and philosophical comprehensiveness of 
this Scotch-French lawyer, only thirty years of age. 
Nor was this his only contribution to our history. 
When Washington was inaugurated in 1 789, and 
the Treasury Department was created, Alexander 
Hamilton was made Secretary of the Treasury — 
a surprising elevation for so young a person and one 
so inexperienced in finance. But like all of Wash- 
ington's appointments it was fully justified by re- 
sults. All unprejudiced critics agree that his man- 
agement of the Treasury Department was one of 
the creative triumphs of American history. What 
he did seems almost incredible. He found the 
financial condition of the new-born nation in the 
worst possible situation. An empty treasury, a de- 
preciated currency, no banking system, and an utter 
absence of confidence in the Government and its 
credit — such was the terrible chaos of the time. 
But as by a magical spell or a divine fiat the mind 



142 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

of Hamilton brought order out of the wreck and 
opened a new era of scientific adjustment and pro- 
gressive prosperity. 

He inaugurated a poHcy which soon gave to the 
Government revenue and credit. He estabhshed a 
competent banking system. By the assumption of 
the state debts, he bound the states to the general 
government. In his report on the national bank 
he called into life the implied powers of the Con- 
stitution and founded a theory of construction 
which has partly guided our history ever since. In 
his report on manufactures he set forth principles 
which are operative still, and his ideas concerning 
the coinage have not yet been laid aside. In fact, 
that young naturalized foreigner at the age of 
thirty-two, had done more to shape the political 
and economic character of this nation than any 
statesman then living. This was, in a degree, rec- 
ognized at the time, and Hamilton became the 
idolized leader of the largest and most influential 
party in the nation. But he had his enemies. 
They claimed that Hamilton was extreme in his 
centralizing system, inclining toward aristocratic 
and monarchical ideals. And it is true that he had 
little faith in the common people. He desired that 
government should be in the hands only of the 



BURR AND HAMILTON 143 

wise, good and strong. Therefore he was opposed 
by Thomas Jefferson, who was extreme in his in- 
sistence on popular and state rights. The two men 
offset each other, as in an astronomic balance, each 
needful to perfect harmony. It may be granted 
that Hamilton's theory would have been incomplete 
without Jefferson's principle, and conversely. 
There were many who could not accept his theory 
of centralization, and did not believe in the su- 
premacy of a strong national government. The 
lovers of State Rights clung to the old dominance 
of provincial autonomy, and would grant as little 
as possible to the Federal authority. They were 
the Anti-Federalists, who believed that the nation 
was made for the states, not the states for the 
nation. In all things the state authority must be 
paramount, and the Federal Compact must be 
made as light and loose as the Constitution would 
permit. 

Aaron Burr, for personal and partisan reasons, 
adopted these principles and became the opponent 
of Hamilton ; and thus the battle was joined between 
the two. While the latter represented the centri- 
petal force of a sovereign nationality, the former 
advocated the centrifugal tendency of State Rights. 
Hamilton believed in a strong central government; 



144 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

Burr stood for the opposite. These conflicting ideas 
divided society between them. Each of them had 
its following, the former principally among the 
higher classes and the conservative minds, the latter 
with the young, ambitious and radical. So intense 
were the political dissensions and party strifes thus 
engendered that the whole country was at times 
convulsed. Personal animosities were kindled and 
every election endangered the public peace as ser- 
iously as the slavery contests in after years. 

This state of things brought Burr and Hamilton 
into frequent collision. Each antagonized the oth- 
er at every point; but Hamilton had great advan- 
tages. He was the counselor and favorite of the 
administration then in power. Washington con- 
fided in him and let him use the patronage of the 
government in political operations. He employed 
this influence freely, perhaps unscrupulously. Ham- 
ilton was a man of excitable temper and ardent 
passions. His morality was of a low grade, and his 
religious scruples very weak. He could resort to 
any means of partisan warfare and undoubtedly 
inflicted on Burr many and grievous wrongs. His 
rival retaliated with fierce and fearless effect. The 
two men became personal and professional enemies, 
between whom no peace was possible. Burr, know- 



BURR AND HAMILTON 145 

ing that Hamilton could not be dislodged from his 
political eminence, determined to destroy him in 
person. 

This he accomplished by means which were at 
that time the recognized resort of men of the world. 
Challenging his opponent to mortal conflict on the 
ground of injuries received from him, he gave him 
no rest until in spite of Hamilton's repeated efforts 
to explain and assuage, he finally forced him to the 
alternative of a duel or dishonor. Hamilton felt 
committed to the false standard of gentlemanly 
duty then prevalent in society, or he did not 
possess the moral courage to disregard it. And 
thus came to pass that memorable tragedy of July 
1 1 th, 1 804, when in a lonely hollow, amid the 
hills of Weehawken, as the sun was rising over the 
ocean, and the shores of New York, these two 
splendid men, who had been so useful and promi- 
nent, met in fatal enmity, and Alexander Hamilton 
fell, to rise no more. 

It was the triumph of Aaron Burr ; but it was also 
his final and utter defeat. Better for him and his 
fame that he had died then and there at the hand of 
Hamilton! For from that hour he was a doomed 
man. The effect of his rival's death was to shock 
and exasperate the Northern States. Not since 



146 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

the discovery of Benedict Arnold's treason had the 
pubHc mind been so startled and driven to despera- 
tion. Burr was denounced as a murderer. War- 
rants for his arrest and imprisonment were issued. 
He fled for his life. Very few of his former 
friends dared to acknowledge him. His name be- 
came a by-word and a hissing. All the avenues 
of political advancement were closed to him. After 
a time, when the storm had partly subsided, he re- 
turned to his former place, but all was changed. 

He became a restless adventurer, trying to or- 
ganize a filibustering enterprise against Mexico. 
But he failed miserably. He was arrested and 
tried on the charge of treason against the Govern- 
ment for his ambitious schemes in the West, but 
was acquitted on legal technicalities. Yet public 
opinion denounced him as an enemy of the Re- 
public. He went abroad, and his evil fate follow- 
ed him everywhere. He returned to New York 
and lived and worked there as a lawyer for thirty 
years, but always under a cloud. The mark of 
Cain was on him to the last, when he died in pov- 
erty and obscurity, attended and helped only by 
one faithful friend, who clung to him to the end. 

In the lapse of time, and with the calmness that 
comes from candid consideration of causes and ef- 



BURR AND HAMILTON 147 

fects, we are able to judge those terrible events more 
leniently and wisely than was possible then. We 
now see that the tremendous outburst of popular 
indignation which followed the death of Hamilton 
was not entirely due to a reprobation of the means 
by which it was brought about. Duelling was then 
recognized as one of the duties of so-called honor, 
the last resort of a gentleman in self-defense. As 
such, it was sanctioned by usage and social judg- 
ment. A long list of eminent names could be 
quoted in favor of it. Gates, Clinton, Randolph, 
Clay, Jackson, Decatur, Arnold, Pitt, Wellington, 
Canning, Fox, and Sheridan were famous men who 
had met their antagonists on the field of honor so- 
called. 

It was not, therefore, a crime, at least in the esti- 
mation of the majority of the society of the day, 
that Burr had challenged Hamilton or had killed 
him. Indeed, it is certain that if Hamilton had re- 
fused the challenge, he would have been condemn- 
ed by the social code of the time, as he knew full 
well. The main reason for the general outcry 
against Burr was the fact that the leader of the 
Republicans had destroyed the great champion of 
the Federalists. It was as a political triumph and 
catastrophe that the event assumed such tragic as- 



148 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

pect. This is plain from the fact that Burr was 
never condemned for his deed in the South, where 
his sympathizers were in the majority, and that even 
as Vice-President, he presided over the United 
States Senate with unimpaired influence afterward. 
PubHc opinion must, therefore, be held largely re- 
sponsible for that fatal duel, and partisan excitement 
for the obloquy which it brought upon the victor. 
If Hamilton had slain Burr, it is not probable that 
similar consequences would have ensued. To the 
end of his life Burr never showed the slightest regret 
for his deed, or treated it in any other way than as 
a painful but necessary duty. The only compensa- 
tion to be found in that lamentable affair appears in 
the fact that it put an end to duelling as an honor- 
able resort, at least in the Northern States. It 
awoke the conscience of the people to the moral 
character of such a practice, and so effectually ex- 
posed its evil that never again did public opinion 
sanction it in the North, as it had done previously. 

Aaron Burr and Alexander Hamilton stand as 
witnesses of the solemn truth that the absence of 
sound moral principles is a fatal defect in any char- 
acter. Nothing can take the place of that strong 
foundation which true religion lays at the basis of 
life. Without it, the noblest superstructure must 



BURR AND HAMILTON 149 

be insecure. If a pure inheritance, a godly example, 
and a fine endowment, could secure to anyone a 
good start in life, Burr had such an advantage in 
an extraordinary degree. All that Christian influ- 
ence and opportunity could bestow was placed in 
his hands. He had culture, position, success, as few 
young men of his time enjoyed; and yet he lived the 
life of a resolute unbeliever, a refined sensualist, a 
hardened advocate of some of the worst principles 
of worldliness. Few Americans have known so 
bright and auspicious an opening of career as he. 
At one time he was within reach of the successorshij 
of Washington, but the fatal law of selfishness im- 
pelled him to a course that negatived all his advan- 
tages and brought him to untimely failure and irre- 
mediable disgrace. 

We might say as much, though in lesser degree, 
of Hamilton. He, too, possessed exceptional qual- 
ities of mind and heart. He developed ability and 
performed a work so great as to provoke the aston- 
ishment and admiration of the nation to this day. 
But he was radically defective in moral principle. 
He knew nothmg and cared nothing for the Chris- 
tian religion, having had none of Burr's early ad- 
vantages. This left him exposed and weak on the 
side where the peculiar trials of his time beset him. 



150 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

He could not rise above the prejudices of the hour. 
He never distinguished between true and false ideas 
of honor. He had not the courage to assert, or per- 
haps the vv^isdom to perceive, that higher law of 
righteousness which the government of God lays 
upon man. And so he fell, in the bright morning 
of his life, when yet the future was opening before 
him possibilities of success such as few of his day 
could command. He perished, a sacrifice to his 
own incomplete and faulty equipment. No more 
sad or more useless, needless waste of greatness was 
ever made. 

And yet these are but specimens of the fell work 
of Sin, with which every age and land in history 
abounds. From the beginning Moral Evil has been 
inflicting just this kind of mortal injury upon our 
race. How many a rare and radiant beginning has 
it overcast and darkened with untimely failure! 
How often has the child of many prayers been lured 
to ruin, and the man of gallant renown been dragged 
down to death, by this foul fiend! It would seem 
that by this time the sad history of mankind would 
have warned everyone away from the fatal enchant- 
ments of selfishness and taught them that the only 
safety of the soul lies in the service of God and his 
truth. 



BURR AND HAMILTON 151 

But no! Aaron Burr is being repeated over and 
over again, in the pride of mind and self-w^ill which 
is even now^ constraining so many to a rehgion of 
culture and indulgence as the whole duty of man. 
And Alexander Hamilton's rise and fall may be wit- 
nessed all the time in those great intellectual suc- 
cesses which end only in moral failure because of 
their essential deficiencies. When will this world 
learn the lesson, taught it so often and in vain, that 
all is vanity and vexation of spirit except that fear of 
the Lord which is the beginning of wisdom! This 
nation has great reason to be thankful for the ability 
of the political and military leaders who have guided 
the course and shaped the fortunes of its history. 
But we have also sometimes had reason to deplore 
the low standard of righteousness with which our 
public affairs have been conducted. When we ob- 
serve the trials which are engendered by partisan 
conflict, and the self-assertions of the political field, 
we cannot wonder that so many have yielded to the 
temptation to pride and the unscrupulous sacrifice 
of means to ends. But it is equally plain that the 
people as a whole are involved in all such demorali- 
zations, for with the leaders their followers stand 
or fall. 



152 



STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 



Let it be the prayer and faith of every patriot 
that Divine Providence will preserve us from the 
hero-worship which regards success as the only test 
of merit, and make us more careful in our bestowals 
of honor and authority. 

God send us men Tvhom to serve and follow Tvill 
be to secure the great ends of truth and righteous- 
ness! 




Ulysses S. Grant 



THE record of the men whom this nation has 
honored and by whom it has been enriched, 
is full of illustrations of the law of vicissi- 
tudes. Just as Nature abounds in surprises, 
continually interrupting its routine with variations, so 
History seems to be capricious and unaccountable 
in its favoritisms. The high-born and well-circum- 
stanced children of fortune are not always the win- 
ners in the race of fame. Where kings and nobles 
fail, there a plebeian Luther, an unknown Napo- 
leon, an unexpected Bismarck, comes to the front 
and prevails. 

Our own national past furnishes so many instances 
of this principle of variation that the wonder is that 
political managers and party leaders do not more 
frequently take it into account in their calculations. 
Certainly it has been more often true than the re- 
verse that the more eminent and popular and prom- 
ising a man, the less are his chances of reaching the 
great goal of political success. Such prime favor- 
ites as Clay, Scott, Seward, Conkling and Blaine 
were defeated by comparatively obscure or inex- 



154 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

perienced men. But this is no more mysterious than 
the well-known fact that family life often develops 
the most extreme departures — an Aaron Burr spring- 
ing from the ancestral stock of Jonathan Edwards, 
a Dwight Moody from unreligious conditions, a 
Robert Ingersoll the son of a Christian minister. 
Even so the Bible says that the first shall be last and 
the last first. David and not Jonathan ascends the 
throne. Saul, the persecutor, and not Peter, James 
or John becomes the great champion of the cross. 

When the veteran William H. Seward, to whom 
seemed to belong of right the chief honors of the 
Republican party in the crisis of the great anti-sla- 
very contest, was displaced for the Presidency by 
the comparatively little-known Abraham Lincoln, 
most people in the East were astonished and disap- 
pointed. But they lived to see the wisdom of that 
selection made manifest. It was the rigorous disci- 
pline and hard apprenticeship to trial which Lincoln 
had gone through that gave him the humble, teach- 
able, progressive spirit needed in the Moses of the 
new dispensation. We tremble to think of the result 
if such ambitious and dogmatic characters as Phil- 
lips, Wade or Sumner had been at the helm of the 
Ship of State through the terrible voyage of the 
Civil War. 



ULYSSES S. GRANT 155 

Our military history is even more instructive on 
these Hnes. When the war opened, all eyes and 
hearts were turned toward General Scott, a vener- 
able hero who had been for so long the military pride 
of the nation. But it soon appeared that he was 
disabled by age for the chief command. His chosen 
successor was Robert E. Lee, one of the most ac- 
complished officers of the regular army; but this 
hope was frustrated by Lee himself. Next appeared 
McClellan, rising suddenly into view with an acci- 
dental notoriety, and at once elevated by popular 
clamor in the most unreasonable manner to a prom- 
inence which he was not able to maintain. Then 
appeared and disappeared in swift succession Hal- 
leck, Rosecrans, Pope, Burnside, Hooker; and of 
them each men thought "This is the coming man", 
only to find themselves disappointed by the issue 
of events. But as Samuel the prophet, after seeing 
the seven sons of Jesse pass before him in vain, found 
at last the chosen of the Lord in the unthought-of 
youngest son, so the American people were led to 
a discovery which no one had anticipated, in their 
search for a Leader. 

In the West a quiet, plain man was among the 
first volunteers to respond to the nation's call. He had 
received a military education, and had served some 



156 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

years in the army, faithfully and well, but without 
acquiring special distinction. In fact, he had lost 
confidence in a military career and had retired to 
civil life, where he soon sank out of sight in the 
crowd of bread-winners. Plain in appearance, 
modest in manner, with little apparent business abil- 
ity, and somewhat disadvantaged by his reputed 
habits, he was about the last person in the state of 
Illinois who would have been thought of as having 
a great career before him. Indeed, when he applied 
to the authorities at the outbreak of hostilities for a 
position as an officer, he found great difficulty in 
getting anything to do. No one wanted him or 
seemed to believe in him. 

It is hard for us now to imagine the pathetic pic- 
ture of U. S. Grant waiting humbly in the ante- 
room of the State Capitol for a reply to his applica- 
tion for employment; and at last sitting down to fill 
out blanks, as the only work that could be assigned 
to him. After he had received a commission as 
Colonel, through the efforts of friends, he was unable 
for some time to take his position, owing to inability 
to buy a uniform. And even then, he was only one 
of a great crowd of new-fledged officers, among 
whom there were hundreds, thousands, whose pros- 
pects of fame were brighter than his. 



ULYSSES S. GRANT 157 

The battle of Belmont gave to his name its first 
general publicity. This was soon followed by the 
great victories of Ft. Henry and Ft. Donelson, when 
the American people, with their well-known inflam- 
mability, began to take fire at the sound of this new 
name, helped by the happy omen of "Unconditional 
Surrender" Grant. And yet no one ventured to 
associate him with McClellan or Halleck, until after 
the bloody battle of Shiloh ; and then the hero-hunt- 
ers began to think of him seriously. But for a long 
time the East could not accept the rising celebrity 
with enthusiasm. Stories about his rude manners 
and plain dress and intemperance were rife. We 
clung to our brilliant cavaliers and would not give 
up our cherished ideal. But when the tremendous 
campaign of Vicksburg sent its thunders over the 
land, we began to waver, and when the brilliant bat- 
tle of Chattanooga crowned the list of conquests, we 
gave way entirely. 

Yes, there tvas the man : chosen not by us, nor by 
anyone; helped upward by no political wire-pulling, 
recommended by no newspaper clique, but lifted and 
established by his own essential character, — thus 
came the chieftain to his host. In spite of obscure 
antecedents, against the current of counter influences 
for others, in the face of the opposition of many in 



158 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

high places, General Grant made his way by sheer 
force of ability and achievement. On March 4th, 
1 864, he received the command of all the armies of 
the United States. Taking the supreme position un- 
der the Secretary of War, he became the dictator 
of all the campaigns of the North. And from that 
moment the national cause went on, conquering and 
to conquer. The calm, comprehensive glance of 
that one mind took in all the fields of contest. The 
firm, unwavering grasp of that one hand held stead- 
ily all the lines of operation, and that one will and in- 
telligence gave such unity and vigor to the national 
armies that their ultimate success was only a question 
of time. 

It has been urged that much of General Grant's 
success was accidental. He came to the headship 
of the armies at a fortunate time. He received a 
support from the Government which other generals 
did not receive. He was a favorite of fortune. But 
people forget that he did not begin with these ad- 
vantages. He earned them by a long course of 
faithful devotion to duty. There was no accident 
in Fort Donelson, Vicksburg or Chattanooga. And 
when we say that he was the selection of Provi- 
dence, we mean that God chooses those who are 
worthy of His choice. Whatever the^ historian or 



ULYSSES S. GRANT 159 

the critic may say about this wonderful career which 
began so humbly and eventuated so grandly, the 
believer in Divine Providence recognizes it as a fair 
specimen of the ways of God with men. The se 
lections by which the world has been supplied with 
its true heroes are almost always a matter of surprise 
to the world. It is the babe in the basket by the 
Nile, it is the shepherd boy with his sling, it is the 
fisherman on the lake, who is summoned to the high 
place of destiny by that mysterious Will whose ways 
are not our ways, neither are its thoughts our 
thoughts. How often has all human probability 
been confounded by the decrees of Fate or For- 
tune, as men say! But as christians believe, God 
chooseth the weak things of the world to confound 
the mighty, and finds His favorites where no one 
else would have looked for them. But He makes 
no mistakes. And we should learn from our his- 
tory to put more confidence in the Divine Will and 
ask for its appointments in the affairs of the nation 
as well as of the church. 

Another lesson may be learned from the military 
career now before us. It is this: the true condi- 
tions of success are to be found in devotion to duty. 

This was the ruling principle of General Grant's 
life, — absolute absorption in the duty of the hour. 



160 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

When he began his professional career he had no 
more idea than others had of what awaited him, nor 
did he ever pay any attention to the future and its 
rewards. He never made of Destiny his star, as 
Napoleon did. His invariable habit was to address 
himself unreservedly to the work given him to do, 
however small or unremunerative, and perform it to 
the best of his ability. As he says in his autobi- 
ography : 

"Every one has his superstitions. One of mine 
is that in positions of great responsibility everyone 
should do his duty to the best of his ability, when 
assigned by competent authority, without apprehen- 
sion or the use of influence to change his position." 

This was his only ambition. While other gen- 
erals might keep their eyes fixed on public opinion, 
jealous of the awards of fame and willing to do any- 
thing to help forward their own interests. Grant 
seemed utterly careless about his reputation. He 
never sought or prized promotion. It was the work 
given him to do, wherever and whatever, that filled 
his thoughts. So he became known as a patient, 
plodding, tireless soldier, who could be depended on 
for thorough fidelity. 

This unselfish devotion to duty was shown in 
many ways. When displaced by Halleck after 



ULYSSES S. GRANT 161 

Shiloh and treated with great coldness by the gov- 
ernment, he stepped down as quietly as he had step- 
ped up and took a subordinate position without a 
murmur. Very different this from General Buell, 
an eminent soldier of whom much was expected, 
but who, on being assigned to a command under one 
of inferior rank, resigned his post and refused to 
serve. Grant had no such professional pride. He 
was ready for a high or a low place as his superiors 
might decide. When at last he was appointed to 
the headship of all the armies, he seemed to be more 
surprised than anyone else; nor did he ever betray 
any elation or egotistic self-confidence because of 
that honor. For glory he cared nothing apparently, 
for duty everything. And that was the secret of his 
success. For in the long run, it is fidelity that pre- 
vails. Men soon detect the hollowness of selfish- 
ness and tire of it. Even when it is sustained by 
pre-eminent ability, as in a Caesar or a Frederick, 
it wearies the world that is compelled to admire it. 
But steadfast devotion to principle, honest, earnest 
work, is sure to impress men favorably, even though 
it may fail of the highest results. This was rec- 
ognized by Grant himself in describing his career 
to a friend: 



162 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

"Perhaps one reason why I received rapid promo- 
tion was that I never allowed myself to deviate from 
the path of duty, from doing the work that was 
assigned to me. My sole desire was to end the 
war. At its close I never aspired to any political 
office." 

Wellington's despatches never mention the word 
"Glory" but often the name "Duty" ; and that spirit 
at last rose above the star of Napoleon, who thought 
only of Power and Fame. Whoever would win a 
crown at the end of the race, let him begin with no 
thought about it, but rather with the idea of doiiig 
today's work well. Many a youth may be reading 
now the stories of Lincoln and Grant with envious 
desire for such celebrity as they achieved, but per- 
haps with little thought for the long, slow and costly 
process by which they attained to that end. No 
harvest ripens, however, for those who will not 
sow the seed. What is this but the comment 
of human experience on our Lord's assurance: 
"He that seeketh his life shall lose it, but he that 
loseth his life for My sake, the same shall keep it 
unto life eternal." 

Another lesson from this history recommends to 
us the simplicity of strength. Everyone associates 
with the name of General Grant the idea of strength. 



ULYSSES S. GRANT 163 

a vigorous intellect, dauntless courage and indomita- 
ble will. He was emphatically a strong man. A"? 
such the world regards him, and history will record 
him. No one could look upon that face with its 
square and rock-like firmness, so expressive of Pa- 
tience and Power, without receiving the impression 
of a leonine character. But the crowning feature 
of that massive mightiness was its Simplicity, the 
absence of all pretence and parade. And this was 
the more significant because military life almost al- 
ways develops a love of display. The martial ele- 
ment is naturally and rightfully a proud one. It 
requires the accessories of music and uniform and 
banners and formalities. The arbitrary authority 
of the commander is properly embellished with a 
pomp and circumstance which would be out of place 
in civil life. For this reason, military men make 
much of rank, and style and dignity, as is meet and 
fit. But there is a well-known liability to extremes 
in this, and too often the tendency to "fuss and feath- 
ers" detracted from the reputation of our generals 
during the War. We remember the pompous airs 
of Fremont in Missouri, the arrogant self-assertion 
of McClellan on the Peninsula, the vain-glorious 
pronunciamentos of Pope and Hooker. Good 



164 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

soldiers they, brave and able, but we all felt that 
pride had gone too far with them. 

With Grant it was different. No one even thought 
of accusing him of top-heaviness. In dress and de- 
portment he was almost too careless of appearances. 
Such a noble dignity in regard to military style as 
that of General Hancock and C. F. Smith was in 
keeping with high rank; but of this the Silent Gen- 
eral never thought. One might meet him on the 
road and but for his escort mistake him for a trooper. 
His headquarters were of the simplest description. 
He discouraged all tinsel and show in his staff, and 
in his personal relations was as unconventional and 
commonplace as any subaltern, much more so than 
some. His one test of character was ever ability 
to work. He judged himself and everyone else by 
the business standard. What can he do? What 
has he done? His orders were plainly written and 
his reports, even of great victories, simply stated. 
To his inferiors and superiors alike, he meant busi- 
ness, — only that, but that at any cost. 

At first this bare, prosaic habit disappointed ob- 
servers who had been accustomed to the loud and 
dashing style of martial heroes; but after a time 
everyone came to distinguish between show and sub- 
stance, and to appreciate the value of the latter. 



ULYSSES S. GRANT 165 

When we saw him conduct that marvelous cam- 
paign around Vicksburg, with no personal baggage, 
and only a shelter tent for cover, ordering the storm- 
ing of Missionary Ridge and accepting it as a matter 
of course, holding the Army of the Wilderness to 
its bloody work, with the quiet remark that he would 
fight it out on that line if it took all summer, and so 
on through the dreary siege of Petersburg, always 
the sam.e firm, unpretentious but indomitable worker, 
we came to realize as never before that Simplicity 
is the highest phase of Force. 

The grandest energies of Nature are the quietest 
— light, heat, gravity. TTie sunbeam makes less 
stir than the lightning, but it does more and better 
work. So with Life. The ripest scholars are the 
least dogmatic, the richest artists those whose art 
conceals itself, and the best Christians invariably the 
humblest and most self-denying. This virtue of 
simplicity found its brightest expression in the human- 
ity and gentleness of the great conqueror. Unspar- 
ing and stern in battle, he was alwys clement and 
modest in victory. He recoiled from the list of 
killed and wounded, but was especially interested 
in the number of prisoners taken. The terms granted 
by him to Pemberton at Vicksburg and Lee at Ap- 
pomattox were so generous as to awaken objections 



166 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

in the minds of many who were more severe than 
himself: — as was shown by the way that he pre- 
vented President Johnson from wreaking fell ven- 
geance on the South at the close of the War. 

The tremendous losses of the Wilderness Cam- 
paign and its unsatisfactory result are ofter cited 
against the humanity and military genius of General 
Grant. He has been called by some "the butcher" 
of the War; but impartial history has already vin- 
dicated his policy of perpetual conflict at any cost 
as the best, the only course he could have pursued. 
It was the only way to meet and conquer the re- 
doubtable enemy who had defeated every other 
force brought against him. Grant knew that Lee 
could not be out-generaled or out-fought. He must 
be conquered, if at all, by sacrifice. That awful 
campaign of ceaseless attack wore out the Confeder- 
ate endurance and so brought an end to the war. It 
was, in the long run, a merciful as well as a severe 
treatment. 

In his personal relations he was genial and com- 
panionable. Taciturn in public, he was a cordial 
conversationalist in private, as frank as Lincoln and 
as approachable. His greatness stood that most 
searching of all tests, the test of familiarity. In all 
this, he was a type of what the war developed in 



ULYSSES S. GRANT 167 

our national character, the lasting superiority) of the 
moral qualities. Not show, but substance, not pa- 
rade but performance, not selfishness but magnanim- 
ity, not pride and arrogance but devotion to truth 
and the common good, — these are the characteristics 
of all genuine greatness. Our age and land are 
liable to disregard these prime attributes and sub- 
stitute for them the showier traits of dress, deport- 
ment, flourish and noise. For this reason, we know 
so much more than we ought to know about shams 
and deceits, inflation and collapse. Well for us to 
remember what Lincoln said of the buried soldiers 
at Gettysburg : 

"The world will little heed or long remember 
what we say here; but it will never forget what they 
did here." 

The young German Emperor made himself 
offensive to many by the egotism of his pub- 
lic utterances, while the great Von Moltke, 
in the published records of his campaigns, 
hardly once uses the personal pronoun. At 
the famous surrender scene of Appomattox 
General Lee appeared in his most splendid style 
of elaborate uniform and dignified behavior. Gen- 
eral Grant was in his ordinary dress, plain and worn 
as that of a common soldier. 



168 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

It cannot be said with truth that he was in all 
respects an ideal soldier. He had not the magnetic 
power of enthusiasm, with which Sheridan and Han- 
cock inspired their men, nor did he possess the 
grand symmetry of character which was the charm 
of G. B. Thomas, the only general we had who 
never made a mistake nor suffered a defeat. Grant's 
personality was of the calm, and catholic order 
which has much of the negative as well as the posi- 
tive elements of greatness. His military operations 
were not in all cases faultless. Impartial history 
holds him, with Sherman, responsible for the sur- 
prise and disaster of the first day at Shiloh, and for 
the needless, terrible defeat of Cold Harbor. The 
exposure of Washington to the raids of Early, the 
retention of Benjamin F. Butler in command of the 
Army of the James, and his unjust treatment of Lew 
Wallace, are also set against him on the books of 
fame. Indeed, it is well known to those who have 
studied his life that no small part of his success was 
due to a man whom the public never recognized, 
John Rawlins, his Chief of Staff. This was one of 
the most remarkable characters that the war pro- 
duced; a young lawyer of no military experience, 
but who entered the volunteer service and developed 
a genius of practical administration which was of the 



ULYSSES S. GRANT 169 

utmost value to the General, whose chief adviser 
and agent he became. It has been said by compe- 
tent critics that but for him there would have been no 
General Grant at the head of the armies. But, all 
these abatements allowed for, there remains a great 
military life which, if it does not rank with the su- 
preme masters, Caesar, Frederick and Napoleon, 
takes its place with such men as Washington, Well- 
ington and Oyama, of the secondary if not inferior 
grade. 

The severest trial of his character took place 
when he exchanged the military for the political life. 
The Presidency of the nation, during two terms of 
office, was indeed a crowning honor, but it was also 
the sternest test of his career. No battle or cam- 
paign, nor all of his martial labors together, ever 
searched and sifted his nature as did those eight 
years at Washington. For then the very qualities 
that had strengthened him for war were liable to 
weaken him for peace. The habits of absolute au- 
thority and of implicit confidence in subordinates 
which are essential to military success, are not so 
compatible with the proper exercise of civil func- 
tions. Instead, then, of holding him responsible for 
all the blame deserved by his counselors and by the 
various forms of corruption which were so rife amid 



170 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

the confusion that followed the war, it should be a 
cause of gratitude that the President made so few 
mistakes, and conducted the nation so well through 
one of the most troublous periods it has ever known. 
The headship of the nation was not sought or de- 
sired by him, and was accepted only as a great bur- 
den which patriotism commanded him to bear. Let 
those who are disposed to criticize him as President, 
consider what Lincoln would have done as a Gen- 
eral. The Duke of Wellington won little fame as 
Prime Minister of England. Rare indeed are the 
Cromwells and Washingtons who are as eminent in 
the Cabinet as in the field. 

But we are not yet done with the lessons of this 
illustrious life. Perhaps its most impressive features 
were reserved for its close. Certainly not until after 
he had retired from the Chief Magistracy did U. S. 
Grant reach the apex of his fame. Then he receiv- 
ed the honors of the World. That trip around the 
globe was a fit culmination of his career. It was 
without a parallel in human history. No king or 
queen ever made a journey of equal length with sim- 
ilar incidents. An American citizen, without office 
or attending officials, wearing no badge of merit 
and displaying no sign of authority, traveling with 
his family and a few friends at their own expense. 



ULYSSES S. GRANT 171 

was received by the dignitaries of the world with 
more than royal honors. From the Occident to the 
Orient and from the gates of the morning to the set- 
ting sun, every land and clime seemed to do him rev- 
erence; and when he retired to his native land, the 
collection of souvenirs and presents of all kinds 
which he brought with him formed a museum of 
wonders which is still unequalled elsewhere. 

How proud we all were of him, of the simplicity 
with which he bore the weight of the world's ap- 
plause, the manly modesty of his triumphs! And 
what credit did we feel reflected upon ourselves 
from him as a representative character who had made 
cur national name so illustrious in the eyes of all 
men ! And if the hero had then chosen to sit down 
quietly in the shadow of his fame content with the 
ample harvests already secure, his career might have 
shown an ideal completeness. But a malign fate 
interfered to mar it with those impulses of ambition, 
or those influences of association, or whatever the 
forces were which combined to draw him again into 
the vexed turmoil of political contention, and then 
to darken with defeat a name which had become the 
synonym of success. 

But even this was not the worst. What evil 
spirit tempted him to the fatal embroilment of finan- 



172 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

cial complications and involved him in the dark and 
devious ways of speculation? If it is said that here 
again he suffered from the faults of his qualities, and 
became the victim of that confidence in others which 
was the product of his own self-conscious integrity, 
the reply must be that Nature makes no allowance 
for ignorance when its laws are violated. Whether 
one's implication in wrong-doing is direct or indirect, 
punishment is sure to follow, and often to be most 
severe where it seems to be least deserved. In the 
sad and sudden ruin which fell like a thunderbolt 
on the great man's prosperity, all should see that 
Greatness is not above the authority of law. In- 
deed, the loftier the eminence, the more extreme the 
fall. It is one of the false and condemnable errors 
of Old- World monarchism that "the King can do 
no wrong." History has refuted that fallacy in the 
most terrible manner again and again. "Nobility 
confers obligation" is a much truer and nobler max- 
im, for it involves the divine law that from him to 
whom much is given, much will be required. 

Perhaps the pathetic story of our great Captain's 
fate, as the wonderful life that had known so many 
golden and glorious honors drew to its close, amid 
storms and darkness, was permitted in order to teach 
our rash and selfish and grasping American disposi- 



ULYSSES S. GRANT 1 73 

tion certain lessons which it needs to learn. Our 
national liability is to extremes in everything. We 
are never content with much, we must have more. 
And it is this feverish straining after what we have 
not, this discontent and rapacity of appetite, which 
is the cause of many of the moral diseases and injur- 
ious mistakes from which we suffer. If such a sim- 
ple, strong and manly nature as that of General 
Grant was unable to resist this fearful current, we 
can understand why so many weaker lives are swept 
away by it. And if he could not escape the retri- 
butions of law, who else can hope to do so? 

But perhaps the melancholy close of that adven- 
turous career will have in the eyes of history a value 
which an unclouded sunset could not have given. 
The spectacle of the strong man, rising in his pain 
to the level of his old heroism, and facing his disasters 
with the same brave, firm front which he had shown 
so often on the battle-field, his proud and honorable 
acceptance of ruin with no complaint, his laborious 
effort to write the record of his life with feeble hands, 
and his patient endurance of hopeless anguish to the 
end, — all this has added a picture to our national 
gallery of which we may well be proud. For it also 
shows to us the nation's heart melted and flowing out 
to him as never before. His old soldiers showering 



174 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

theii' condolences upon him, his former enemies vying 
with friends to show their sympathy, the South la- 
menting its conqueror as the North its champion, 
and far and wide through the whole world the bells 
of the nations tolling in honor of his memory, — yes, 
the Hero's death was worthy of his life. 

The story of this military life may well serve to 
stimulate and direct the warlike spirit which is so 
popular and powerful in our American life. We 
cannot deny that our national history bears witness 
to the value of this element in the hearts and lives of 
men. How could this Republic have been establish- 
ed originally, or rescued from ruin subsequently, 
without the stern help of War? 

At the same time, we must remember that our civi- 
lization is rapidly outgrowing this ancient and dire- 
ful recourse, and is learning the better wisdom of the 
great system of Arbitration, which is the crowning 
glory of our present progress. To this benignant 
end the great General would, if living, be sure to 
devote his utmost endeavor; for the last and best 
word of his military career was the immortal sen- 
tence "Let us have peace." 

Let it serve to instruct the new generations of 
citizens that the soldier is needed by his country. 
Never, so long as human nature and society are what 



ULYSSES S. GRANT 175 

they now are, will there cease to be the impending 
danger of war, and the consequent need of prepar- 
ing for it and guarding against it. The military 
spirit and its appropriate culture should always re- 
ceive the proper amount of regard at the hands of 
American education. Reverence for the Flag and 
a martial devotion to its interests should be a part 
cf our religion. 

But the career of U. S. Grant teaches most forci- 
bly the lesson that the true soldier holds his profession 
not as an end hut as a means. War, or the possi- 
bility of it, is not to be lauded as the prime business 
of life. They are but the painful incidentals of 
progress and of pacification. The warrior is never 
so noble as when he sheathes his sword and says, as 
the great Captain said: "Le/ us have peace!" 





GIROLAMO SAVONAROLA 



)avonarola 



T' HERE were reformers before the Reforma- 
tion. That great reHgious movement which 
opened the course of modern Christian pro- 
gress was not in itself an absolute begin- 
ning. It had been prepared for by many previous and 
parallel incidents in the religious history of Europe. 
Again and again had earnest protestants lifted up 
their voices against error and in favor of truth. Some 
of them were heeded by their time and became suc- 
cessful apostles of Christ to their fellow men. Of such 
were Arnold of Brescia, Peter Waldo, who origin- 
ated the noble sect of the Waldenses, which remains 
to this day, and John Wiclif, who gave to England 
the Bible in the vernacular of the common people, 
and opened the door of deliverance through which 
his people passed in after time. 

But all the reformers before the Reformation 
were not so fortunate. Witness the martyrdom of 
Huss in Bohemia and Jerome of Prague, the suffer- 
ings of the Albigenses in Italy and the Lollards in 
England. It was given to many in those times to 
repeat the office of John Baptist and be as a voice 



178 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

crying in the wilderness, and to perish as he did be- 
fore his eyes had seen the Kingdom of God which 
he announced. It is to the sad, yet glorious career 
of one of these prophets whose words came to naught, 
these pioneers who failed to introduce what they 
intended, that our attention will now be devoted. 

Girolamo Savonarola lived in Italy from 1452 to 
1 498. His life was contemporary with the rise and 
development of that great revival of the spirit of an- 
cient art which brought to Europe, after the fall of 
Constantinople, the treasures of Grecian literature, 
and awoke the era of classic learning in which we 
still live. It was called the Renaissance; and it 
was truly a new birth of human thought and wisdom, 
as it applied to modern time the grand impulses of 
ancient culture. Who can compute what our civili- 
zation owes to the services of Homer and Virgil, 
the philosophy of Plato, the music of Sophocles and 
Aeschylus, the wisdom of Socrates and Seneca? It 
was like the rising of the sun on a darkened world; 
and nowhere did the beauty of morning burn more 
brightly than at Florence, where the wealth and 
taste of the Medici had established a Court renown- 
ed for its patronage of art, letters and pleasure. 
Italy then abounded in cities which surpassed all the 
rest of Christendom in their industrial, artistic and 



SAVONAROLA 1 79 

financial prosperity. At a time when England, 
France and Germany had but small and poor centers 
Oi trade, where an ignorant people suffered under 
rude and despotic rulers, the opulent and enlightened 
states of Italy were rich in flourishing marts, active 
ports, noble museums and libraries, with busy facto- 
ries, well cultivated fields and a world-reaching com- 
merce. 

And Florence, the home of Lorenzo the Magni- 
ficent, was pre-eminent for its splendor in welcoming 
poets and philosophers, artists and artisans, scholars 
and politicians to its halls of luxury and its feasts 
of pleasure. It was there that Dante's sublime 
poem had recalled the genius of Homer and antici- 
pated that of Milton, while Petrarch had wedded 
elegant scholarship to immortal verse. It was from 
Venice that Marco Polo went forth to explore the 
mysteries of Asia. It was at Genoa that Columbus 
was born. And it was a Florentine astronomer, 
Toscanelli, who gave to the great discoverer a scien- 
tific idea of the Atlantic Ocean and the treasures 
hidden in the West. Such was Italy four hundred 
years ago, easily the Queen of European civilization. 
But there was another side to this brilliant picture, — 
a dark, forbidding side. 



180 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

The Italy of the fifteenth century was in fact a 
strange medley of extremes. While Art was 
achieving its most brilliant triumphs, Religion had 
fallen into decaying formalism. Where learning 
was cultivated among the higher classes, it was un- 
known to the lower. The most elegant courts and 
thrones of Christendom were the seats of utterly un- 
bridled despotism and profligacy. Alexander, 
the Borgian Pope, was a murderer at Rome, 
and Lorenzo the Magnificent was the cruel 
and licentious ruler of Florence. Even 
Venice, beautiful Queen of the Sea, was 
held by the dark, mysterious power of a 
tribunal secret and cruel as the grave. Everywhere 
culture was wedded to corruption. The Decameron 
remains to show how foul could be the fairness of 
romance. While Titian was covering the canvas with 
immortal hues, and Raphael was portraying the 
Madonna, and Angelo was hanging his firmament 
of marble in the air. Cardinals were buying and sell- 
ing the offices of the church, bravos were killing at 
the command of the court, and poisoning was a fine 
art, studied by lords and ladies. The priesthood 
was full of venality and licentiousness. The Bible 
was an unknown book, buried in the cloister or read 
in an unknown tongue. There was no care for Di- 



SAVONAROLA 181 

vine truth among theologians, nothing but a study 
of scholastic tomes and a vanity of metaphysical 
polemics. It was an age of formality, ceremonial- 
ism and worldliness, very similar to that which had 
debased and polluted Jerusalem in the bloody days 
of Herod and the Roman domination. But according 
to the old Hebrew proverb, "When the tale of bricks 
is doubled, then comes Moses;" and it often occurs 
that the extremes of moral perversion awaken re- 
actions which may bring about the correction of the 
evil. 

At Ferrara, then a large and noble city, was 
born, on the twenty-first of September, 1452, one 
who was commissioned to be the John Baptist of a 
new era. Young Savonarola sprang from a family 
of good reputation, his father being a learned phy- 
sician connected with the court. The boy was 
therefore from the first surrounded with great ad- 
vantages in the church and in the State, and he 
might have given himself to a life of ease and 
luxury. But his was a nature too fine and pure to 
be deceived by the false appearances of evil. He 
early felt the true nature of the times, and shrank 
from it. The splendor and the cruelty, the wealth 
and the poverty, the costly pleasures and the sad suf- 
ferings of society, pained him by their terrible con- 



182 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

trasts, while the hollow pretenses of the Church, 
the hypocrisy of its gilded forms, and the utter 
worthlessness of its complex ritual, astonished and 
disappointed him. Of his inner life we know but 
little, except through such expressions as these found 
in one of his youthful essays: "I see the whole world 
in confusion. Every virtue and every noble habit 
is gone. There is no shining light. None are 
ashamed of their vices. That soul is deemed refined 
and rare who gains the most by fraud and force, who 
scorns heaven and Christ, and whose constant 
thoughts are bent on others' destruction." Strange 
words these to flow from the lips of a youth, but 
they show that on him had fallen the dread mantle 
of the olden prophets, Jeremiah, Jonah and Malachi, 
whose fate it was to see and denounce the evils 
which a blinded age could suffer from but not dis- 
cern. 

The result of this painful experience was that he 
decided to devote himself to a religious life, and at 
the age of twenty-three he entered a monastery and 
became a member of the Dominican order. This 
was at that time the only way of publicly professing 
a Christian faith and devotion to the salvation of 
souls. Whatever evils may have flourished in the 
system and practice of Romanism at large, it is cer- 



SAVONAROLA 183 

tain that in an age of universal corruption the clois- 
ter was often the sole refuge that was open to spiritual 
behevers. The monk and the nun were sometimes, 
not always, genuine refugees from worldliness, who 
sought by a life of professional self-denial to attain 
to purity and peace. This was the sole ambition of 
young Savonarola. Turning his back on all the 
pleasure and pride of earth he devoted himself to a 
life of prayer and study. For seven years he was 
absorbed in the Sacred Scriptures, until, as the story 
goes, he knew the Bible every word by heart. And 
we can imagine how congenial to the fiery-hearted, 
emotional Italian must have been the pages of the 
Old Testament, all aglow with the wrath of the 
prophets and their bold philippics. There he learn- 
ed the courage of public denunciation, and the ideal 
of a Kingdom of Righteousness on earth. The 
Lamentations of Jeremiah, the warnings of Jonah, 
the stern predictions of Malachi, seemed prophetic 
of the situation and needs of Savonarola's own day. 
For he found that the Church was as corrupt as the 
State. TTie unworldly calm of the monastery hid 
errors and evils as dangerous as any that flourished 
in the court. Wherever he looked, the youthful 
monk saw only a revival of the dark times which the 
Hebrew prophets deplored. 



184 STUDIES IN BIOGFIAPHY 

He was transferred in 1 482 to the convent of San 
Marco, in Florence, and there he entered the arena 
of his great life-work. But no sign of his future 
greeted him, as he crossed the threshold of the most 
splendid estabHshment of its kind in Italy. San 
Marco was renowned for the wealth of its endow- 
ment and the eminence of its patronage. Cosmo 
and Lorenzo of the Medici had enriched it with 
priceless treasures of literature and art, which made 
it the shrine of scholars and painters as well as of 
religious devotees. The pure and tender genius of 
Fra Angelico had left its walls adorned with those 
frescoes of Scripture subjects which are still the ad- 
miration of artists. There in the cool and quiet 
precincts of scholastic seclusion, amid the beauties 
of gardens and galleries, adorned with all that lux- 
urious culture could invent, — there might be found 
the Paradise of a thoughtful, devout spirit. And 
Savonarola could have dreamed away a long life 
in that Arcadian retreat, caring only for his own 
salvation, peace and joy. But not so. On him had 
come the solemn inspiration of the open eye and the 
awakened heart. He had received that burden of 
the Lord, which of old made of Elijah an accuser 
of royalty, and of John Baptist an arouser of the 
nation. Such souls may never lie down on the pop- 



SAVONAROLA 185 

pied ease of this world's soft seductions. They are 
driven by the spirit into protest and denunciation 
against the wrongs which they see ; they cannot help 
becoming revolutionists and iconoclasts. So it was 
with the young Dominican. He beheld around him 
a great and rich city, filled with all that wealth, art, 
learning and power could contribute to its enrich- 
ment, and yet as foul and fatal as it was fair. Lo- 
renzo the Magnificent was a murderer, a debauchee, 
a tyrant. His court was the abode of profligacy 
and crime. Society was corrupt in all its branches. 
Public opinion was debased, morality was unknown. 
And religion had no other effect than that of cloaking 
and condoning the universal depravity. 

This was what Savonarola saw from his pure and 
peaceful retirement in the cloister, and the vision was 
to him what that of the antediluvian world was to 
Noah. He forgot his own ease and security. His 
soul was overwhelmed with anguish for others' sake. 
He could not sleep, for the fiery visions of impending 
judgment. Yielding to the pressure of his convic- 
tions, he went out into the world and began to pro- 
claim the law of God. Through the city and through 
the country he was heard, like Jonah, warning men 
to flee from the wrath to come. His own brother 
tried to dissuade him or to modify his all-denouncing 



186 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

zeal, but he would not be suppressed; "Yet thirty 
days, and Nineveh shall be destroyed," was the 
burden of his appeal to Florence and to Italy. The 
philosophers and literati of the time treated him as 
the Egyptian wise men treated Moses. The priests 
and cardinals regarded him as the Pharisees and 
Scribes regarded John Baptist. But neither scorn 
nor rebuke could silence the thunder of that new 
voice from God. At last the royal court began to 
hear it, and intimations came from Lorenzo, in his 
palace, that the monk would do well to be more care- 
ful of what he says. "Go, tell your master," was 
the stern reply, "to prepare to repent of his sins, 
for the Lord spares no one and has no fear of the 
princes of the earth." 

Thus the new Elijah. And soon responses began 
to be heard. The slumbering conscience of the 
people was awakened. Crowds attended the min- 
istry of the fearless preacher who dared to utter 
what all knew to be true. His popularity grew rap- 
idly. He was elected Prior of San Marco, and thus 
became an official of public rank. But he only 
continued his humble, faithful service to the truth. 
So great was his influence with the people that the 
court tried by every means to win him to their side, 
but in vain. He persisted in his bold and righteous 



SAVONAROLA 187 

course, exposing all wrong and insisting on the 
claims of God alone to the service of men. At last 
the reign of Lorenzo the Magnificent drew to a 
close. As the foul and cruel tyrant lay on his 
death-bed, he was asked what confessor should be 
sent for, that he might receive the final blessing of 
Holy Church. "Send for the Prior of San Marco" 
said he. "He is an honest man. No other ever 
dared say No to me." But when the man of God 
stood beside the dying sinner he demanded of him 
as the condition of absolution three things: "First, 
it is necessary that you should have a full and lively 
faith in the mercy of God." "That I have, most 
fully," replied the prince. "Second, you must re- 
store that which you have unjustly taken, or enjoin 
your sons to restore it for you." The tyrant hesi- 
tated, but finally assented. "Third, you must re- 
store liberty to the people of Florence." At this 
Lorenzo turned his face to the wall, and remained 
silent. Whereat the Dominican left him to die in 
his sins and go to judgment without help or hope. 

The death of the Medicean tyrant removed from 
Savonarola the principal obstacles to the success of 
his reformatory measures. There remained no one 
able to compete with him for the popular favor. 
He stood alone as the champion of righteousness, 



188 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

and none of his enemies dared to oppose him pub- 
Hcly. But he was also helped by the political ex- 
igencies of the times. The Florentines were awak- 
ening to the fact that their municipal privileges were 
in danger. Under Lorenzo they had been nominal- 
ly free, at least from external authority. But his 
son Pietro, who inherited the father's vices without 
his ability, became the weak tool of the plotting Bor- 
gian Pope. This infamous Pontiff, Alexander the 
Sixth, aimed at an absorption of all the Italian states 
under the secular power of Rome, and Florence had 
reason to dread such an extinction of its ancient 
autonomy. 

To add to their perplexity, Italy was suddenly 
invaded by a French army under Charles the Eighth, 
who was on his way to seize the vacant throne of 
Naples. Florence was directly in the path of the 
invaders, and its cowardly ruler thought to propi- 
tiate them by opening the gates to the French hosts 
and welcoming them to its walls. At this the peo- 
ple rebelled. Their excitable Italian blood took 
fire, and they furiously drove out the miserable ruler, 
who had betrayed them, and took the reins of au- 
thority into their own hands. But who could lead 
and regulate the fierce populace in their sudden in- 
dependence? In danger of utter anarchy and dis- 



SAVONAROLA 189 

solution, they had but one recourse, and that was to 
elevate the Prior of San Marco to the vacant head- 
ship. He was the only man in whose courage, wis- 
dom and rectitude they could confide, in their extrem- 
ity, and he was accordingly vested with supreme 
authority. In the name of the Lord whom he served, 
Savonarola accepted the position, and by his fear- 
less diplomacy soon freed the ancient city from its 
enemies. 

Then began one of the most remarkable episodes 
of political history. This plain, untitled monk, with- 
out army or aristocracy to support him, but depend- 
ing solely on spiritual authority, attempted an entire 
reconstruction of society. Using his pulpit as a 
throne, and preaching to the people as a Christian 
teacher, he advised and carried out the most search- 
ing reforms. "Seek first the Kingdom of God," 
said he. "Jesus Christ shall be the only King of 
Florence." Such were the texts of his new political 
economy. The fickle Italians, tired of the old regime, 
and for a time deeply moved by the righteous appeals 
of the new leader, were easily induced to accept his 
propositions. A republic was decreed. It was es- 
tablished that Church and State should henceforth 
be free of any authority but that of God. Every 
citizen should be equal to all others before the law. 



190 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

and there should be no laws but those of the King- 
dom of Heaven on earth. For himself, the great 
preacher renounced power but only as the regent of 
Christ. He had no personal supremacy, and would 
accept no honors or emoluments. Thus was set up 
in Florence a Theocracy of the purest kind, modeled 
after the government given to the tribes of Israel in 
the desert, a prophecy of the Millenium yet to dawn 
over the whole world. And for three years the 
results were of the most satisfactory kind. Flor- 
ence became a new city. The old vices and crimes 
disappeared, apparently. Temperance, chastity, truth 
and honesty took their place. In public and in pri- 
vate there was a peacefulness, a purity and right- 
eousness which even the enemies of the new order 
were compelled to recognize. It really seemed that 
the New Jerusalem had been established on earth, 
and the ideals of the New Testament were about to 
be realized. 

But with all his rectitude of principle and lofti- 
ness of aim, the great Florentine reformer had failed 
to provide for certain contingencies. He did not 
take into the account the uncertainties of popular 
feeling or the persistent power of foreign enemies. 
And he soon discovered that the Kingdom of God 
was not to come so quickly or securely as he hoped. 



SAVONAROLA 191 

The cruel, crafty Pontiff saw in him a rival to his 
own supremacy, and tried to seduce him. Flattery 
and honors were offered the Dominican, but he refus- 
ed to leave Florence for Rome. Then severity was 
resorted to. He was forbidden to preach. He was 
ordered to the Vatican. Discovering the snare, he 
defied its author. Then excommunication was hurl- 
ed against him, that unspeakably awful weapon, 
which rarely failed to subdue anything in mediaeval 
Europe. Yet even this must have failed of its effect 
but for the enemies whom Savonarola began to find 
at home. 

The mercurial people were growing weary of their 
new and higher life. Having no personal spiritual- 
ity to sustain it, they found that righteousness had its 
burdens and costs, which became onerous after the 
charm of novelty had passed away. The exiled 
Medici also had their emissaries at work, and thus 
public opinion began to turn against the Prior of San 
Marco. First whispers, then protests, at last organ- 
ized resistance appeared. The religious orders, 
apart from his own, had been jealous of his pre-em- 
inence; and thus the papal interdict, co-operating 
with popular discontent, became at last an over- 
whelming power. The storm broke, and before it 
the reformer was helpless. 



192 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

He was arrested, with two of his monks, and im- 
prisoned on the charge of heresy. From the heights 
to the depths he passed with one step. But he met 
adversity with the same high-hearted consecration 
that had sustained him in prosperity. He remained 
true to the truth that had been given him to advocate. 
Neither argument nor torture could shake his con- 
stancy. Like his Lord, he witnessed a good con- 
fession, though all forsook him and fled. The great 
city, which but yesterday rang with his praise, now 
suffered him to sink in disgrace. Of all the crowds 
who had welcomed him as God's Messiah, not one 
individual protested in his behalf; but to its endless 
shame Florence permitted its heroic champion to be 
tortured by the emissaries of Rome and finally burn- 
ed at the stake, as a common malefactor. 

It ivas done: — a deed the blackest of all crimes 
of which the Papacy of the Middle Ages was guilty. 
It was done in the public square of the city which, 
but a short time before, had almost worshipped 
Savonarola as a Divine ambassador. And then 
Florence sank once more under the foul tyranny of 
the Medici, never again to hear the voice of truth 
or see the beauties of righteousness, but to be aban- 
doned to the fell consequences of its own selfish, 
cowardly choice. Thus ended the Reformation in 



SAVONAROLA 193 

Italy. Not to this day has the Gospel reappeared 
with any saving power in that classic land. For the 
great revival of truth in the next century, under Lu- 
ther, made hardly any conquests south of the Alps. 
Florence, like Jerusalem, knew not the time of its 
visitation, and was therefore excluded from all share 
in the glories of Christ's Kingdom when the day of 
the Lord dawned upon the earth. 

But the question well deserves to be asked and 
answered, What were the causes of Savonarola's 
failure? Why should he meet with such disaster 
in the service of truth, when Luther and Calvin 
achieved so great success in the same service after- 
wards? No one can doubt the genuineness of the 
Florentine Reformer's zeal, the purity of his mo- 
tives, the loftiness of his aims. He was evidently in- 
spired by the Holy Spirit in much that he said and 
did. And he crowned a patriotic, philanthropic 
christian life with a death as glorious as that of any 
of the martyrs who had suffered for the name of 
Christ. Why, then, did he and his cause come to 
such a calamitous end? 

The reasons were partly external and partly inter- 
nal to himself. For one thing, his environment was 
not so favorable as was Luther's. That logic of 
events, which provides for all the successes of time, the 



194 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

true occasion, did not accept Savonarola's experi- 
ment. It was made too soon. The age was not 
ready for him, as it was for Luther. The cup of 
Rome's iniquity was not yet full in the fifteenth cen- 
tury. Another cycle must roll around before Eu- 
rope could be prepared to see the enormity of its 
wrongs and be ready for their cure. Then, too, the 
Florentine reformer had no such strong political 
friends as the German found in the brave barons and 
the Elector, who were willing to assist anyone who 
should protest against the hated tyrant of the Vati- 
can. The North of Europe has always been the 
home of freedom, and its true-hearted people have 
given to the truth a more congenial element than is 
found in the excitable but fickle sons of the South. 
These and other causes combined to render Savon- 
arola's task a much more difficult one than Luther 
found. 

But the principal difference between them appear- 
ed in the method which they pursued. The Italian 
reformer was as truly devoted to the Gospel as the 
German protestant, but he applied the truths of grace 
to general rather than to particular ends. He 
preached the claims of righteousness on the state, 
and directed the Divine law to the reformation of 
public morals and political abuses. TTiis was his 



SAVONAROLA 195 

chief end, and therein lay his mistake. He found 
his model in the prophets of the Old Dispensation 
rather than the apostles of the New. Instead of 
imitating Jesus, who began with the individual and 
instructed his disciples first to apply the Gospel to 
the personal soul, Savonarola began with the nation 
and tried to save it in a mass. But this was a re- 
versal of the Divine method, which Luther in the 
next century avoided. The German reformer let 
the state alone and addressed the individual sinner. 
Although he did advocate afterward the union of 
State and Church (and to that extent weakened the 
cause of the Reformation in Germany) his personal 
ministry was always bestowed on evangelistic ends. 
His preaching was aimed at the conversion of souls. 
This was the Gospel plan, and it succeeded, for it 
laid the foundation of public morality in personal 
regeneration. 

Savonarola's idea of a Christian State, made so 
by collective, general treatment, was a false one, 
however well-intentioned by his glowing heart. He 
found that his edifice, so fair to see, had no basis 
in human life, but yielded to the first pressure of out- 
side opposition. And therefore he failed. His no- 
ble ideal could not be realized, for it belonged to 
the Law rather than to the Gospel. But it was of 



196 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

use in demonstrating the futility of the conception, 
so dear to the reformers of every age, that the King- 
dom of God can be estabhshed by force and favor. 
This idea has always had its advocates, but they 
have never succeeded, when they tried to materiahze 
it. Calvin achieved a success, apparently, at Gen- 
eva, when he made of that principality a religious 
state renowned for its orthodoxy. But even then 
his zeal for the truth led him into the fatal error of 
persecuting heresy. The burning of Servetus for his 
opinions darkened the name of Calvin forever; and 
after his death Geneva did not long retain the purity 
into which he forced it. It was so with the Pilgrim 
Fathers, who tried to establish a Theocracy in New 
England. Their grand ideal of a government and 
a community which would exclude all unrighteous- 
ness and honor God and His law alone, was found 
to be impracticable. It not only failed, but it en- 
gendered reactions of hard formalism and harsh se- 
verity. 

No, the Head of the church knew what was in 
man when He said, "The Kingdom of God cometh 
not with observation." His disciples and the people 
at large urged him to ascend the throne of David 
and wield a secular power, but he refused. "The 
Kingdom of God is within you." He confined him- 



SAVONAROLA 197 

self to the personal heart, insisting that men must be 
born again. It was by calHng them to himself, one 
by one, that he formed the nucleus of his church; 
and he sent them out to reach the world by preaching 
the Gospel to every creature. This and this alone 
has ever been the method of Christian success. Not 
by reaching the small through the large, but by begin- 
ning with the part and thence proceeding to the 
whole. The Kingdom of Heaven is the grain of 
mustard seed; it is the leaven in the midst of the meal. 
Savonarola forgot this. His hot Italian blood, fired 
by the zeal of the ancient prophets, flowed furiously 
forth to overturn the wrong and set up the right at 
once and forever. He would begin at the roof and 
build down to the foundation. He would purify 
the stream first, the fountain afterward. But he 
failed, as all will fail who try to go faster than God. 
Truth has never prospered in this world but along 
the lines of vital logical process. "First the blade, 
then the ear; after that the full corn in the ear." 
Such are the Divine footsteps, that lead from the 
true beginnings to the true endings. 

And this should be heeded by those who are even 
now engaged in the old, old battle for the right, 
which yet is ever new. The reformer of today, 
whose heart is stirred within him by the evils of the 



198 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

world and who feels the inspiration of the prophet 
to denounce the wrong and proclaim the right, — let 
him remember the "kingdom and patience of Jesus 
Christ." Let him beware of the imperious zeal which 
aims at general results to the neglect of particular 
means. Let him always consider that the individual 
is the Divine objective. The first condition of so- 
cial reform, political improvement and religious pro- 
gress, is the work of the Gospel in the personal heart 
of man. 

Savonarola failed, but after all his was a success- 
ful failure. It cannot be classed with the ignomin- 
ious defeats of time. His endeavor came to naught, 
but not in the sense of a useless sacrifice or a blame- 
worthy mistake. It was rather the noble error of a 
soul too brave, too eager, too devoted to a great end. 
He fell as a warrior falls who rushes ahead of the 
battle and hurls himself alone upon the foe. Such 
defeats are never entirely in vain. That life is not 
utterly thrown away which is sacrificed for an ideal. 
It serves at least the useful purpose of showing what 
ought not to be done ; and that is sometimes necessary 
to enable others to do what ought to be done. The 
errors of one generation clear the way for the tri- 
umphs of right in the next. Perhaps Luther's sue- 



SAVONAROLA 199 

cess was partly due to the lessons taught by Savon- 
arola's failure. 

But more than this! Courage, self-sacrifice, high- 
hearted consecration, are never wasted. Whatever 
the immediate result of the martyr's heroism, in the 
end his blood is the seed of the church. TTie charge 
of the Light Brigade at Balaclava was a military 
blunder, but it gave to British bravery a new impulse 
worth all its cost. And so with every loss sustained 
in the battle for the Right. What one age loses in 
them, after ages are sure to gain in the inspiration of 
their example and in the late results of their endeav- 
or. Not one of the martyrs and confessors lived and 
died in vain. 

"Flung to the heedless wind. 
Or on the waters cast. 
Their ashes shall be watched 
And gathered at the last. 

"And from that glorious seed 
Around us and abroad. 
Shall spring a plenteous host 
Of witnesses for God," 

Wiclif's bones were disinterred and cast into the 
sea, but the Bible which he gave to England could 



200 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

not be taken away. Huss perished at the stake; 
but at that fire was kindled a torch with which 
Luther enlightened Europe. And Savonarola's 
grand protest and sublime sacrifice gave to Chris- 
tian history an inspiration which abides to this day. 
Even so there is no such thing as total failure pos- 
sible now among the faithful servants and the de- 
voted soldiers of the Cross. They may not reach 
the ends at which they aim, but they are contributing 
to greater glories than they know. The cross of 
one age becomes the crown of the next. Our moun- 
tains and plains are often composed of the shells 
of numberless creatures which perished that the 
globe might have a higher and firmer floor for its 
life. And thus through disappointment and defeat 
and death is ever rising the new era of humanity, 
the greater glory of God and the higher good of 
man. Oh, for more and more of such successful 
failures in this world! 




Joan of Arc 



^^^^ HE fifteenth century of the Christian era 
1^^^ was filled with great and memorable events. 
Ip^^B It saw the fall of the Eastern Roman Em- 
pire at Constantinople, the revival of clas- 
sical learning in Italy, the introduction of the print- 
ing press, the invention of gun-powder and the dis- 
covery of America by Europeans, In national affairs 
that age witnessed an extreme crisis in the history of 
France. The realm was distracted by intestine 
feuds, and it was also at the mercy of English in- 
vaders, who held the capital of the country and 
some of its fairest portions. Henry the Sixth of 
England had been proclaimed Monarch at Paris, 
while Charles the Seventh of France held his court 
in a small town of the interior. The national sky 
was dark, the people were hopeless, the nobility 
mutinous or despairing. Defeat after defeat had 
been suffered by the armies, until the wretched king 
was driven to consider flight to Spain or Scotland 
as his only recourse. 

But the darkest hour is just before the day; and 
then to France came help, as to the Hebrews in 



202 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

Egypt and the English under the Danes, — help 
from an unexpected quarter and by the most im- 
probable means. In a little village by the Meuse, 
on the eastern border of the Kingdom, lived a plain 
farmer who had a daughter sixteen years of age. 
She was a simple country girl, of good life and 
repute, industrious and useful, busy like other 
maidens with sewing and spinning at home, or tend- 
ing the flocks in the field. She was known to her 
companions as Jeanne Dare, a name Anglicized into 
Joan of Arc. Her father's name, Jacques Dare 
(d'Arc), signified "James of the Bow." 

She was a healthy, hearty person, sociable and 
practical, yet also of an imaginative habit and an 
intensely religious spirit. Nurtured from childhood 
in loyal attachment to the throne, Joan had learned 
to identify the cause of her sovereign with that of 
heaven. France was to her the realm of Jesus; the 
earthly monarch was the visible regent of the King 
of Kings. Therefore her soul burned within her 
on witnessing the degradation and misery of her 
country under the English yoke, and its deliverance 
became the hope, the day-dream of her life. For 
this she prayed with all the fervor of an impas- 
sioned soul. To it she consecrated all her fresh 
and innocent powers, with an enthusiasm which only 



JOAN OF ARC 203 

the age of Chivalry (thenalmostpast but still living in 
some of the Knights of war) could produce. We 
can understand how such a brooding idea and desire 
would mold an opening life; and what effect must 
be produced on it by current tradition, derived from 
ancient prophecies of Merlin, that "France would 
be saved by a virgin from the borders of Lorraine." 
Still it is certain that up to the age of sixteen Joan 
of Arc had made no plan and had entertained no 
thought of attempting anything for her country ex- 
cept what love and hope and prayer could accom- 
plish. 

In the year 1425 a change befell her. On one 
summer's day at noon she was in a little garden 
attached to her father's house. As she afterward 
affirmed, a voice suddenly sounded in her ears and 
a great brightness shone around her. At first 
alarmed and disconcerted, she became accustomed 
to the visitation, which was repeated and took the 
form of angels, who exhorted her to "go to France 
for to deliver the Kingdom." The effect of these 
apparitions, which occurred frequently, was to in- 
spire this simple country-girl with a conviction that 
a great mission lay before her, nothing less than the 
rescue of her native land from its enemies and the 
restoration of its ancient dignity. Surely no more 



204 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

difficult and momentous charge was ever laid upon 
a young heart than this, whether by real or unreal 
agencies. 

No wonder that it at first overwhelmed Joan of 
Arc with surprise and fear. Who was she, that 
such a work should be performed by her? With- 
out knowledge or wealth or influence, a girl young 
in years, of the lower classes, and totally inexperi- 
enced in politics or war, — how could such an one 
succeed where the highest statesmen and soldiers of 
the land had failed? She shrank in every nerve and 
muscle from the awful summons. But it would not 
leave her. Day and night the voices were soundmg 
in her ears and she had no peace of mind until she 
told the strange secret to her parents. They very 
naturally treated it with incredulity, and severely 
frowned upon her new excitement. Nor would 
any one of her relatives or friends give her the least 
encouragement. But she persisted in spite of her 
own falterings and the opposition of others, for she 
could not help herself. Necessity was upon her. 

At last she was compelled to apply to the official 
in charge of the district in behalf of her superna- 
tural commission. The peasant girl stood before 
the Sire de Beaudincourt and earnestly told him, 
"I come on behalf of my Lord, to bid you send word 



JOAN OF ARC 205 

to the Dauphin to keep himself well in hand and not 
give battle to his foes, for my Lord will presently 
give him succor." "Who is thy Lord?" asked the 
wondering officer. "The King of Heaven," replied 
the girl. Whereupon the magistrate set her down 
as an insane person, and ordered her taken back 
to her parents. This, however, was but a tempo- 
rary rebuff. The voices and visions continued their 
urgency in Joan's heart, and she repeated her appeals 
to the governor, that he would send her to the king, 
in order that she might offer herself as a champion 
for France against the English. The Gallic nature, 
always inclined to a romantic interest in woman, at 
last caught the fire of her intense enthusiasm, and 
Joan of Arc was consigned to the care of an armed 
force, who conducted her more than three hundred 
miles to the royal residence. 

Arrived at the court, the crisis of her fate was 
met by her with calm courage and enthusiastic zeal. 
On the ninth of March, 1429, this village maiden 
was introduced to the royal presence at Chinon. 
The king stood in the midst of three hundred 
knights of war, high officials and ecclesiastical dig- 
nitaries. He purposely laid aside the insignia of 
his rank and appeared as one of the assembly, not 
differing from the others in office, in order to test 



206 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

the discernment of his new visitor. But she recog- 
nized him at once, although in the dusk of evening, 
and kneehng before him, announced her high call- 
ing. "Gentle Dauphin, my name is Joan the Maid. 
The King of Heaven sendeth you word by me that 
you shall be anointed and crowned in the city of 
Rheims and shall be lieutenant of the King of 
Heaven. It is God's pleasure that our enemies, the 
English, should depart to their own country." 

Like everyone else, the king was at first con- 
founded at the novelty of her appeal, and knew 
not what to make of her personally. But after, in 
a private consultation, he had heard from her what 
he had supposed was a secret known to no one but 
himself and which had given him great anxiety, he 
began to believe in her sincerity and authenticity. 
Severe tests, however, were applied to her. A 
council, composed of some of the most eminent pre- 
lates and philosophers of the realm, was appointed 
to examine her claims to supernatural inspiration. 
For two weeks this inquisition was conducted with 
rigorous care, and, as a result, a verdict was pro- 
nounced in her favor. It was formally declared by 
the bishops and statesmen that Joan of Arc was the 
virgin foretold in the ancient prophecies, notably in 
those of Merlin, as the savior of France in its ex- 



JOAN OF ARC 207 

tremity; she had been sent by God to rescue the 
kingdom, and, as such, she should be recognized 
and obeyed. Nor was this all. A committee of 
women was directed to investigate her personal 
character and moral worth. Three of the greatest 
ladies in France, the Queen of Sicily, the Countess 
of Goncourt and the Baroness of Treves, subjected 
Joan to an examination, which also resulted in her 
favor. They declared that they found nothing in 
her life but truth, virtue and modesty, and they 
espoused her cause with feminine enthusiasm. 

Then the King yielded, and with him everyone 
else, to the Divine authority of this maiden's cause. 
She was officially empowered to organize and con- 
duct a campaign in the service of the nation. With 
this came a universal outburst of popular applause. 
The highest of the realm, priests, statesmen, soldiers, 
bowed down before the maiden, and all the people 
shouted her name as that of a new Messiah sent 
from heaven. It was never hard to raise an excite- 
ment among the French, especially by sentimental 
appeals. And there was something so new and 
wonderful and touching in the spectacle of a young, 
innocent, untried female assuming such an elevated 
position that the hearts of the most romantic people 
in the world were easily moved toward her, espec- 



208 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

ially at that particular moment, when all other hopes 
had failed and nothing but darkness rested elsewhere 
on the realm. The story and presence of Joan of 
Arc were like a gleam of sunshine on a stormy day. 
Yet through it all, this village maid retained the 
modesty and gravity of a superior mind. Earnest, 
devoted, absorbed in her high calling, she was as 
unmoved by applause as she had been indifferent 
to blame. And so she entered upon the great work 
of war, to lead the armies of France against the 
invaders. 

We must condense the story of her military ex- 
ploits into a brief compass. But it reads like a 
page from the fairy tales of Chivalry. We see the 
unschooled maiden of seventeen, who had but a 
short time before been an obscure peasant, fare 
forth as the champion of France. Clad in shining 
white armor, her head bare with its flowing tresses, 
wearing a cross-belted sword at her side, and the 
gonfalon of the realm over her head, mounted on a 
black war-horse, she heads the army, and veteran 
soldiers are proud to follow her. Inexperienced in 
war and a stranger to the sight of blood, she ex- 
hibits all the courage, skill and firmness of a trained 
soldier. Advancing rapidly to the relief of Orleans, 
a city besieged by the enemy, she rallies its discour- 



JOAN OF ARC 209 

aged defenders, leads them in the attack, and 
although wounded in the fight, turns defeat into 
victory and drives away the foe with great slaughter. 
An offensive campaign is then entered upon, and 
against the advice of experienced men of war, is 
conducted with such energy that the English are 
repeatedly vanquished and at length driven from 
the region. Next came the coronation of the King 
at Rheims, as a result of her great success, a result 
deemed impossible, according to all the ordinary 
probabilities of war. 

Thus, within one year, the champion had ful- 
filled her promises and prophecies. She had done 
what all the statesmen and warriors had failed to 
do. She had shown a wisdom, courage and power 
that appeared superhuman. And indeed it was her 
religious faith that inspired her from first to last. 
The voices and the visions were her never-failing 
counselors. She resorted to prayer at every crisis, 
and said that Divine help came as an answer. What 
wonder that soldiers, priests and people alike looked 
up to the white-armored chieftainess as to a celestial 
leader, and believed in her as commissioned from 
heaven in their behalf! 

If this story could pause here, it would remain 
one of the glories of time. But it flows on beyond 



210 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

this point, and soon into darker scenes. The Maid 
of Orleans, as she was called, had accomplished her 
mission in the coronation of the King, and the ex- 
pulsion of his enemies from that part of the realm. 
With that wonderful success she ought to have been 
content, for beyond it her Divine commission did 
not extend. But she was not content. Swept 
along by the current of popular enthusiasm, and 
perhaps her own zeal, she now entered on further 
enterprises, in which she was not so successful. The 
confidence and ability shown by her previously seem- 
ed to leave her. She could not exercise the same 
mysterious power over others. As a result, the 
French arms met with many disasters, and at last, 
in a rash venture of arms, the heroic maiden found 
herself abandoned by her comrades and seized by 
her enemies, the Burgundians. 

Joan of Arc a prisoner! The terrible news flash- 
ed far and wide, and at once the charm of her 
ascendancy disappeared. All the latent jealousy 
and discontent, with which her strange accession to 
power had been regarded in the highest circles, burst 
forth. The priests were especially active, and the 
great warriors equally so in exclaiming against her 
as a sorceress who owed her unnatural fortunes to 
the force of witchcraft. The English, still in pos- 



JOAN OF ARC 211 

session of many provinces, offered ten thousand 
francs to her captors, who basely sold her to them, 
the mortal foes of Joan and of France. Then the 
Inquisition at Paris demanded that she be delivered 
to the church, to be tried by its courts on the charge 
of sorcery, heresy and other crimes. Worst of all, 
the King and his court made no effort in her behalf. 
Incredible as it is, the shameful truth remains that 
the monarch who owed his crown to the peasant 
girl who had rescued him in the name of God from 
darkest humiliation abandoned her in the time of her 
extremity. And so the hapless maid, after one short 
year of conquest and glory, found herself a fettered 
prisoner in the hands of her malignant foes. The 
soldiers whom she had defeated in battle thirsting 
for her blood and the ecclesiastics whose pride 
she had offended by her independence, determined 
on her destruction. 

No need to describe the so-called trial with its 
prejudged case. During three months an infamous 
tribunal employed every artifice of legal and theo- 
logical chicanery to embarrass and entrap the simple 
girl of eighteen whom they all dreaded. But her 
truthfulness, her virtue and courage defied them. 
From the first, she had foreseen her fate, indeed had 
predicted it before her capture. She was therefore 



212 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

prepared for the worst; but nothing could induce 
her to confess that she had not been divinely directed 
to her mission. A form of abjuration was extorted 
from her by guile, but this was afterwards shown 
to have been a deceitful document. W^ith all her 
heart she held fast to her simple creed of heavenly 
inspiration. 

For this she was formally condemned by the court, 
consisting of one Bishop, nine Abbots, eight canons, 
twenty-one priests and twenty-three Doctors of Div- 
inity, as having been the agent not of God but of the 
Evil One; and therefore guilty of blasphemy, 
imposture, indecency and heretical opinions. The 
miserable King and his malignant advisers did noth- 
ing to save her, and so she was handed over to the 
secular arm, after the poor fiction that the Church 
could shed no blood. But the English had no such 
scruples. Their vengeance was swift. On the 30th 
of May, 1431, in the marketplace of Rouen, the 
poor girl was burned at the stake for a witch and a 
heretic, she clasping a cross in her hands and with 
her last breath crying the name of Jesus. TTius 
ended one of the brightest and most heroic episodes 
of France's history, which was also the darkest and 
most shameful page of its national dishonor. 



JO.-W OF .ARC 213 

It is with a degree of satisfaction that we read 
the sequel to this strange narrative, for it shows that 
justice triumphs in the long run. The Elnglish, who 
thou^t that the death of their great enemy would 
free them from fear, found that the opposite result 
was reached by her maltreatment. The resistance 
to the invaders becaime more intense. The Ere kin- 
dled b}- Joan of Arc spread rapidly, and in hventy- 
t%so years from her death, the last ElngHsh soldier 
wa5 dnven out of the realm and France was free, 
according to her prophecy. The King whom she 
had elevated to a national security-, after enjo^-ing 
the fruits of labors which he had so basely requited, 
perished at last by a most miserable death, tor- 
mented with remorse for his cruel treatment of his 
best friend. 

But more than all was her o\^'n complete indi- 
cation. The reaction of public opinion, after the 
mart>'rdom of the maid, was so great that an inquir>' 
was instituted by the Toyal authoritj-, the result of 
which was an ex}x>sure of the injustice of the tried. 
The sentence of the court was publicly reversed and 
cancelled, and tsvo solemn processions m honor of 
Josin of Arc were ordered to take place annually at 
Rouen, the scene of her execution. 



214 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

And ever since her fame has been growing in 
the pride and honor of the people. The story of 
the peasant girl and the white-armored champion 
will never pass from the heart of France. After four 
centuries of all kinds of vicissitudes, the nation still 
turns to her as one of its great heroes. Her statues 
can be found in many of the great cities of the king- 
dom. Her picture is blazoned with the Saints on 
castle-windows, and at regular intervals in the city 
of Rouen the time-honored procession is performed 
in her honor, and wreaths are laid at the feet of her 
effigy. More than this, the highest personal honor 
which the Church of Rome can bestow has at last 
been conferred on her name. After a long and 
elaborate investigation of her case, extending through 
more than thirty years, the Papal Court decided 
ihat she was well-deserving, and on April 30th, 
1 909, the ceremony of beatification was completed, 
so that the name of Ste. Jeanne of Orleans will 
probably be added to the sacred calendar, which 
all Catholics revere. Surely she did not live or die 
in vain. 

But the question remains with every student of 
history. What is the true view of this wonderful 
record? It is one of the problems of time which 
has received many different solutions. Was Joan 



JOAN OF ARC 215 

of Arc truly inspired of God, as she claimed to be? 
No one has ever doubted the sincerity of her own 
convictions, nor could anyone question the reality 
and greatness of her achievements. But as to 
whether the voices and visions which she believed 
in are to be regarded as matters of fact or of illusion, 
— on this point historians have never agreed. 

The school of critical inquiry which now pre- 
vails in the literary world has no faith in the super- 
natural. It explains all effects by reference to 
natural causes, and it reduces the story of Joan of 
Arc to a narrative of enthusiasm, illusion and myth. 
No need to suppose that she actually saw angels or 
heard them speak. Her nature and circumstances 
explain everything. A feminine soul, filled with 
patriotic anxiety and fired with burning thoughts 
of consecration, would easily apply to itself the 
ancient prophecies of a virgin becoming the savior 
of France. It was an age of romantic ideals and 
sentimental extravagance, when the people still be- 
lieved in enchanted castles and dragons and wizards 
and all the wonders of necromancy. They were 
ready to accept any novelty as something super- 
natural. The Church of Rome always fostered 
belief in miracles, and the maiden of Arc was pecu- 
liarly adapted to such a superstition. Given such 



216 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

a temperament on her part, and then surround her 
with the darkness and distress of a land which was 
waiting for some dehverance with a desperate readi- 
ness, and you have all the conditions of a popular 
success. Everyone in that age believed in super- 
natural interferences, and the French especially 
were an excitable, romantic race. Why then, should 
they not make of this heroine their champion and fol- 
low her with enthusiasm? Her sex, her youth, her 
religious fervor, were all in favor of just such a 
mysterious career as she enjoyed. This is the theory 
of the rationalistic school. Joan of Arc is ranked 
with such patriotic deliverers as Gustavus Vasa of 
Sweden, Alfred of England, Bolivar of South 
America, — men who, with humble origin and limited 
means, achieved wonderful success in rescuing their 
country from its oppressors. 

But we must object to this theory on the ground 
that it does not cover the facts in the case. So far 
from the age and the land being predisposed to 
favor the young adventurer, Joan of Arc found 
everything opposed to her mission. General 
incredulity and resistance had to be over- 
come, at every step. It was only after the 
most rigid tests had been satisfied that she 
was accepted as a leader. More than this. 



JOAN OF ARC 217 

we must account for the fact that she possessed and 
used the gift of prophecy. Against all natural proba- 
bility, this simple country girl foresaw and fore- 
told the main features of her career. At a time 
when no one else believed in her or her words, she 
predicted her going to the King and her mission to 
deHver France. Before a weapon had been lifted 
in her behalf, she announced that she would raise 
the siege of Orleans, and conduct the King toRheims 
to be crowned. On the day previous to the battle, 
she Said that she would be wounded, and described 
the nature of the injury. Repeatedly during the 
campaign she thus anticipated future events, as to 
the results of battles and also of individual fortunes. 
Indeed, her own fate was clearly foreshadowed 
long before it came. Such are the undoubted facts 
in the case. With a few exceptions, all her predic- 
tions were fulfilled. Take it all together, then, her 
obscure origin, her sudden rise against the opposi- 
tion of everyone, her destitution of all natural advan- 
tages, her unparalleled achievements, and her mys- 
terious knowledge of the future, — and is there not 
reasonable ground for accepting her own belief that 
she was called and conducted by Divine power? 

Now, it must be admitted that the Christian stu- 
dent of history has no difficulty in recognizing the 



218 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

supernatural element in human affairs. He is bound 
to believe that God can inspire human 
beings with special gifts, and has done so. 
To him the past abounds in stories paral- 
lel to that of the French heroine. Was 
not Abram called from his humble home to become 
the Father of the Faithful by visions from on high, 
and Jacob, in his wondrous dream at Bethel, and 
Joseph in the strange dreams of his boyhood? Did 
not Moses hear the voice from the burning bush and 
Gideon receive his great commission from the angel 
by the threshing floor? Indeed, the Virgin of Beth- 
lehem and her supernatural visitor, with his message 
from Divinity, presents a picture which the reader 
of the Bible can never forget. He knows that it 
has been the favorite policy of the Holy Spirit to 
choose the weak things of this world to confound 
the mighty, and that the great eras and events of 
spiritual progress have been opened by the humble 
hands of those whom the world would never have 
chosen for such a service. 

Why then, should we hesitate to classify the 
French heroine with the Hebrew heroes? It is cer- 
tain that Joan of Arc was a Christian, according to 
her light. Sharing as she did the Roman faith, 
which was then universal (and apart from which 



JOAN OF ARC 219 

she had no means of knowing any other rehgion) 
she still believed in God with a pure heart. Her 
trust and love were fully bestowed on spiritual truth, 
as far as it was known to her. Not superior to the 
superstitions of her kindred and her time, she had a 
clear perception of and unreserved consecration to 
the higher powers of heaven. There are few lives 
in European history more free from selfishness and 
worldliness that hers. Amid all the temptations 
of triumph and success, she remained humble, spiri- 
tually-minded, self-sacrificing. Faith and prayer 
were her constant conditions. Her life was wholly 
given to the glory of God and the good of others. 
If her story were found written in the Old Testament, 
it would hardly suffer by comparison with that of 
Ruth or Esther. Why then, should she not be can- 
onized in the list of Christian saints? 

But there are several reasons why the Christian 
historian still hesitates. He remembers that a be- 
lief in supernatural visitations and direction has been 
a feature of all kinds of religion and philosophy in 
this world. Intelligent and conscientious persons 
have associated this conviction with a most varied 
theory and practice of duty. Socrates claimed 
that a spirit not his own impelled him to 
his philosophic views. Buddha and Mohammed 



220 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

believed that they had received revelations 
from the Deity. The Roman Catholic Church 
has always held its saints to be under the 
special control of angels. Ignatius Loyola, the 
founder of the Jesuit order, declared that the Virgin 
Mary had appeared to him in visible form, and 
had commanded him to organize a body of men for 
her particular service. Now, if it is admitted that 
Joan of Arc is to be believed in her narrative of 
visions and voices from the spirit world, why should 
not the same credence be extended to these other 
cases? They were each as sincere and positive in 
their conviction and they showed as marked and 
surprising results in their various ways. 

Indeed, we know not where to pause in these 
concessions, once begun. Claims to supernatural 
inspiration have been made by so many and various 
persons, not only by undoubted reformers such as 
Martin Luther, who heard the voice "The just 
shall live by faith" in the church at Rome, or George 
Fox, founder of the Quakers, who was filled by the 
light of the spirit, but by errorists such as Ann Lee, 
mother of the Shakers, who claimed to have a new 
revelation from God; Swedenborg, who declared 
that the heavenly world had been opened to him; 
Joseph Smith, the first Mormon, who received a 



JOAN OF ARC 221 

Divine commission to organize the Church of Latter- 
Day Saints. What shall we do with these intelli- 
gent, devout and devoted souls, each of whom made 
the same claim that Joan of Arc asserted, and some 
of whom have been confirmed therein by the faith 
of multitudes of believers? 

Indeed, this matter of Visions and Voices is one 
of the standing problems of history. Who can 
solve it? How can we discriminate between the 
reality of a supernatural visitation and the illusion 
of self-gendered imagination? It is the difficulty of 
determining what is true and what is false in such 
things that has led the critical historian to discard 
them all as unworthy of belief. But we cannot do 
that. Bound as we are to the spiritualistic theory 
of the Bible, we must hold that there is room for 
the supernatural in human life anywhere and at any 
time. 

Have we, then, a criterion or test that we may 
apply to distinguish the real from the unreal? I 
know of no other than that recommended in the New 
Testament, — "Beloved, believe not every spirit, but 
prove the spirits whether they are of God; because 
many false prophets are gone out into the world". 
Then, as now and at all times, there were many pre- 
tenders to a Divine calling. But how determine as 



222 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

to their validity? "Hereby know ye the Spirit of 
God; every spirit which confesseth that Jesus Christ 
is come in the flesh is of God, and every spirit which 
confesseth not — is not of God". The Gospel of 
Grace is therefore our standard of judgment in 
these matters. The revelation which God gave by 
his Son is the supreme test of all supernatural claims 
in this world. Whatever agrees with it, essentially 
or formally, may be safely accepted, and nothing 
else can be. 

Applying this rule, we have no difficulty in accep- 
ting the experience of Joan of Arc as genuine, and 
rejecting that of Ignatius Loyola as spurious. For 
the one showed in her religious life, its character 
and results, the true spirit of Christ, however obscur- 
ed by the errors of her day; while no such claim 
could be made for the first Jesuit and his work. The 
simplicity and spirituality of the French heroine, the 
necessity for her patriotic enterprise and its evident 
utility, her pious life and noble death, entitle her to 
the rank of those whom the Holy Spirit has truly 
moved and used. And a similar verdict may be 
rendered in favor of Luther, Fox, and other great 
reformers who believed that God called them and 
endowed them for their work. They showed in the 



JOAN OF ARC 223 

motives, methods and results of their mission that 
they were in accord with the spirit of the Gospel. 

But the Spiritualist of today who makes so much 
of apparitions and supernal communication with the 
unseen world is by this rule excluded from christian 
confidence, for the whole drift and effect of that 
system is to establish another Gospel. It supersedes 
the Bible with the medium and his revelations. It 
discards all faith in the cross of Christ, as necessary 
to salvation. It never mentions the Holy Spirit as 
the supreme enlightener of men, nor will it have 
anything to do with the evangelization of the world. 
"By their fruits ye shall know them". 

Visions may be real and yet not good in their 
origin or effect. They may come from celestial or 
from infernal sources. Their real character can be 
determined only by the one test which is of absolute 
authority, — the Person and work of the Son of God. 
He is the Truth incarnate, and all things must take 
their moral value from their relation to Him. 




JOHN WICLIK 



John Wiclif 



OHN Wiclif has been called "the Morn- 
ing Star of the Reformation." Living 
two hundred years before Luther, and in 
another land, his work was a direct pro- 
phecy and preparation for that spiritual sun- 
rise which dawned over Germany in the sixteenth 
century. His life extended from 1 324 to 1 384, 
and was coincident with a very important part of 
English history. That Fourteenth Century wit- 
nessed the real beginning of the strange dualism 
which the Norman conquest forced upon Britain. 
The terrific inundation of William's invasions that 
burst upon and submerged the old Saxon institu- 
tions fertilized the island with the means of a new 
life; and, after time had assuaged the rigors of the 
subjugation, the conquered and the conquerors be- 
gan to fuse into the form and power of a composite 
nationality. The Norman imbued the sturdy Saxon 
stock with a finer taste, a loftier ideal, a wider, 
keener thought; and the result was already becoming 
apparent in the fourteenth century, an age glorious 
in British annals. It was the time of Crecy and 



226 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

Poitiers, that gave to England for a while the mas- 
tery of France. It produced the consummate flower 
of Chivalry in the Black Prince. It gave birth 
to the efflorescence of architecture in many of the 
noblest cathedrals of the land, — Salisbury, West- 
minster, Lincoln, Wells and Peterboro. It was then 
that Chaucer sang the "Canterbury Pilgrimage"; 
and the "Romaunt of the Rose." It was also an age 
full of legal reforms, of educational progress and of 
religious fermentation. 

Such was the environment in which must be con- 
sidered the figure of John Wiclif, a man worthy of 
his race and of the time. Of his birth, parentage 
and early habits we know hardly anything. He 
comes first into clear view at the age of perhaps forty ; 
when we find him at the University of Oxford, the 
most distinguished scholar and writer in that great 
emporium of learning. Oxford was then far more 
eminent than now. Thirty thousand students from 
all parts of Christendom crowded its halls, where 
the Trivium, consisting of Grammar, Rhetoric and 
Logic, and the Quadrivium, Arithmetic, Astro- 
nomy, Geometry and Music, constituted a complete 
course of education, accordmg to the Medieval stan- 
dard. In this vast cosmopolitan society of thought 
and culture Wiclif was confessedly "the foremost 



JOHN WICLIF 227 

man," as one of his enemies admitted, "esteemed 
little less than a god." Then and during his after 
life he was a voluminous writer, sending out scores 
of works upon a great variety of topics and ranking 
thus among the first authors of the time. Adequate 
and eminent distinctions were bestowed on him. He 
was made Doctor in the Faculty of Theology, and 
royal chaplain. 

But this quiet, cloister-led student life, so dear to 
the true scholar, was soon and sharply disturbed. The 
pale thinker was summoned from his books to take 
part in the political and religious strife of the day; 
and he then showed himself to be (what the average 
scholar by no means is) full of practical efficiency, 
not only a zealous patriot and a true reformer, but 
a wise, bold, capable leader. The occasion for this 
entering into public life was furnished by the resis- 
tance of the King to the demands of the Pope for 
the payment of feudal tribute to him, which the 
English government had neglected for many years. 
This requisition was made in such a haughty and 
threatening manner and was so essentially unwar- 
ranted as to arouse the spirit of Edward the Second, 
who with the hearty support of the Parliament 
emphatically refused to submit to it. In 1374, a 
commission was appointed by the crown to confer 



228 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

with the representative of the Papacy at Bruges, 
and of this commission Wiclif was a member. He 
was appointed as the best embodiment of the religion 
and learning of the realm, and he acquitted himself 
so well as to become the accepted champion of Eng- 
land against Rome. From this time on he was the 
deteiTnined and redoubtable foe of the Papacy in 
its claims to temporal power. For this difficult and 
dangerous work he was well fitted by nature and 
training, being a fine embodiment of that new, com- 
posite life which was thenceforth to characterize the 
British nation. The Saxon and the Norman, the 
realist and the idealist, the practical and the specula- 
tive, the strong and the graceful, were blended in this 
scholarly statesman, this devout leader. For, once 
begun, his work could not be dropped. He must 
defend himself against the fulminations of the arous- 
ed hierarchy. Cited for trial as a heretic, nothing 
but the interposition of titled friends saved him from 
the stake. But he feared no one and went on in 
his public and unsparing hostility to Rome, until 
Europe began to thrill with the effect of his words. 
A century and a half before Luther burned the 
Pope's Bull, this English Protestant had branded 
the Pope as Anti-Christ. Indeed it was he who 
kindled the spark of religious freedom which Huss 



JOHN WICLIF 229 

afterwards blew into a flame that gave to Luther 
the torch with which he fired Germany. 

But more: In denouncing Papal abuses he was 
constrained to oppose everything identified with 
them; and his next step as a reformer was to con- 
demn the system of "Mendicant Friars" that had 
filled the land with itinerant priests. They had no 
fixed charge, but moved about, subsisting on the 
credulity of the people and confirming them in the 
worst superstitions. They had become an intoler- 
able evil, even to the extent of fostering immorality 
and crime. But such was their audacity and nu- 
merical strength that the church dignitaries dared not 
suppress them. Wiclif, however, exposed and de- 
nounced them unsparingly, caring nothing for the 
storm of abuse which he thus aroused, but pursuing 
his object with courage and skill to the end. As 
one means of counteracting the evil referred to, he 
organized and conducted a new order of travelmg 
preachers, — honest, godly men, instructed in the 
truth, who were sent throughout the land to live 
among the people and anywhere, at any time, by 
any means, to preach the Gospel. This revival of 
our Savior's method of evangelism, which was also 
adopted by Wesley long afterward, met with great 
success. The common people heard the Word of 



230 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

God most gladly and the whole land was thus sown 
with seed that could not perish. 

Such a crusade as this, however, could not have 
been projected or carried on if Wiclif had not him- 
self been endowed ^^•ith the light of Truth. But 
he was so enlightened ; he was a spiritual believer, a 
man filled with the Holy Spirit. His writings re- 
main to show that he had a genuine christian ex- 
perience. His prime act of faith was reverence for 
the Word of God, in its original simplicity. Thence 
he drew the saving doctrine of salvation by grace 
through Jesus Christ, of dependence on the Holy 
Spirit for sanctification, and of obedience to the 
Scriptures as the rule and aim of life. His theology 
was not as advanced or complete as that of the re- 
formers of the Sixteenth Century, but he anticipated 
them in his grasp of the fundamental truths, and in 
his denunciation of Romish errors, such as the wor- 
ship of the Virgin and the Saints, transubstantia- 
tion, and the celibacy of the Clergy. Indeed, com- 
pared with his antecedents and surroundings, Wiclif 
showed a more vigorous and aggressive spirit of re- 
ligious inquiry than any of the great leaders of the 
church who followed him. It was the judgment of 
Milton that if the impulse given by Wiclif to the 
cause of Christianity had not been arrested by his 



JOHN WICLIF 231 

enemies, the labors of Huss, Jerome, Luther and 
Calvin would not have been required. So certainly 
was he the Morning Star of the Reformation. 

The crown of glory of Wiclif's life appeared in 
his translation of the Bible into the English Ian- 
gauge. He was himself a diligent student of the 
Bible at all times, this being the source of his spiritual 
strength and courage. It was the Word of God 
that made him the protestant and reformer he was. 
But the Latin version (the Vulgate) which the 
scholar studied could not serve the common people; 
and Wiclif saw that the only way to make perma- 
nent the effects of his evangelistic work was to render 
the Scriptures accessible to the masses in their own 
tongue. This had never been the policy of the 
Church of Rome. Indeed it could not be. Sheer 
self-interest compelled the Papacy from the very 
first to withhold the Bible from the masses. After 
the monk Jerome, in the fourth century, had trans- 
lated the originals of the Old and New Testaments 
into the Latin, Rome ceased from its labors in that 
direction, and indeed has never resumed them ex- 
cept in the case of the Douay Version, 1 609. It is 
true that Pope Leo XIII ordered that a new version 
of the Vulgate be made by the scholars of Rome; 
but it is also true that the Decrees of Councils and 



232 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

the traditions of the Church must remain as the su- 
preme authority for the CathoHc faith. It is only 
as the Bible is interpreted by the Church that it will 
be given to the people. 

Wiclif was well aware of this policy and the rea- 
son for it. He saw that the most effective weapon 
against the Papacy would be found in that sword 
of the Spirit which is the Word of God. He there- 
fore projected and completed the stupendous work 
of translating the Latin Bible into the English lan- 
guage. How laborious a task this was, to write 
with his own hand or to dictate the entire Scriptures, 
can hardly be imagined. It was not of course so diffi- 
cult as that of Judson in converting the English into 
the Burmese Bible, or of Carey in a like task for the 
Bengali; for they had a new language to master. 
Nor was it so complex and exacting as the work of 
the last revisers, who had multitudes of versions and 
manuscripts to collate in order to reach a critical 
text. Wiclif knew nothing of the Hebrew and 
Greek originals; his version was merely an English 
rendering of the Vulgate. Nevertheless, in the dar- 
ing of the conception he was alone, and in the fidel- 
ity of his work he has never been excelled. Of late 
years the claim for Wiclif of this priority in the trans- 
lation of the Latin Bible has been disputed at Ox- 



JOHN WICLIF 233 

ford; but these objections do not seem to be well 
sustained. It has not been clearly established that 
his historic precedence can be justly given to anyone 
else. 

Certain portions of the Bible had been translated 
into the vernacular in preceding centuries, but Wi- 
clif's Bible w^as the first complete edition of the 
Word of God that the English language received. 
Copies of it were rapidly made by the hands of eager 
scribes, and although its cost was great, owing to the 
labor of production, it was speedily circulated far 
and wide. More than a century must elapse before 
the printing press could give wings to the Word that 
would carry it cheaply into every land and home. 
Wiclif's Bibles were all written out with pen and ink, 
and must therefore have been bulky and expensive 
books to use. But in this they were exactly like the 
New Testament which the primitive Church pos- 
sessed, and like it they so increased and multiplied 
as to fill the land with the light and power of Divine 
Revelation. 

He lived but two years after his busy hand had 
stopped its tireless tracing, but his life had rounded 
its circle gloriously, and his death was full of tri- 
umph. The England that received his bones to rest 
was not the England that had borne his cradle. It 



234 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

was a new land, thrilling with the advent of a sub- 
lime, a heavenly power. Not Columbus, revealing 
America to Europe, nor Copernicus, laying bare the 
history of the heavens to the earth, accomplished so 
useful, so benign an achievement as he who opened 
the sphere of Divine Truth to the common people. 
For there broke then upon the world the morning of 
a day that has been brightening ever since with the 
blessings of Christianity to men. 

Wiclif's Bible was of course limited in its issue. 
It could not be made cheaply and numerously enough 
to satisfy the popular demand. The reaction which 
followed his death enabled his enemies also to ar- 
rest its circulation and destroy the greater number 
of the copies in use. But the Word of God is not 
bound, and no power could wholly check its career. 
The violent abuse which Wiclif received from the 
Romish clergy is the strongest tribute that could be 
paid to the extent of his work. Said one of the 
high dignitaries: "Christ entrusted his Gospel to the 
clergy and doctors of the Church, to minister it to 
the laity and weaker sort. But this Master Wiclif, 
by translating it, has made it vulgar and laid it more 
open to the laity and even women who can read 
than it used to be to the most learned of the clergy, 
and thus the Gospel jewel, the evangelistic pearl. 



JOHN WICLIF 23$ 

is thrown out and trodden under foot of swine." 
After the Council of Constance, by which his writ- 
ings were formally condemned, his bones were ex- 
humed and their ashes cast into the stream, to show, 
as was supposed, the utter extinction of the heretic's 
influence. But far otherwise was the actual result. 
Rome in this, as in so many other instances, only 
exposed its own malice and impotence; for, as 
Wordsworth has well sung, 

"As thou these ashes, little Brook ! wilt bear 
Into the Avon, Avon to the tide 
Of Severn, Severn to the narrow seas. 
Into main Ocean they, this deed accursed 
An emblem yields to friends and enemies 
How the bold Teacher's doctrines, sanctified 
By truth, shall spread, throughout the w^orld 
dispersed." 

It remains for us now to bestow a glance upon 
the general aspect of this subject of Bible translation, 
which Wiclif's work illustrates. Seven great epochs 
may be noted in the history of the Bible : 

1 The giving of the Law on Mount Sinai (B. 
C. 1491), when its first Scriptural form was 
assumed. 



236 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

2 The compilation of the Hebrew Bible by 
Ezra (B. C. 450), when the Old Testament 
took its present form. 

3 The Septuagint version (B. C, 287), when 
the Hebrew Scriptures were introduced to 
the world of letters by the Greek language. 

4 The Vulgate version of Jerome ( A. D. 400) , 
when our complete New Testament was add- 
ed to the Old, and both, as one book, com- 
mitted to the Latin. 

5 Wiclif 's version into English (A. D. 1 380) . 

6 King James' version (A. D. 1 61 1 ), by which 
the Bible took the form familiar to us. 

7 The last revision, in 1884, by a joint com- 
mission from the English and American 
churches. 

This is a bare outline of the wonderful history of 
this Book as it has come down to us. But it must 
be borne in mind that this is only one of many par- 
allel streams that have been flowing through the cen- 
turies, independent of, or branches from, that which 
has supplied us. In the early ages of Christianity 
we know not how many versions of the original 
tongue were made beside that of Jerome. There 



JOHN WICLIF 237 

were the Syriac, the Thebaic, the Memphitic, the 
Ethiopic, the Gothic, the Armenian, the Arabic, 
Persian and Slavonic; and unknown other trans- 
lations carried the Word of God into all portions 
of the then civilized world. No one can estimate 
the amount of enlightenment and spiritual vitalizing 
thus imparted to the various branches of the human 
family. And when we reflect on the enormous la- 
bor and cost of transcribing these copies, all by hand, 
we can imagine the devotion thus employed. An- 
tiquarians are now employed in searching for these 
ancient manuscripts in the libraries and churches of 
the Orient, and they frequently make most valuable 
discoveries in the copies thus brought to light. Wit- 
ness the work of Tischendorf at the Mt. Sinai con- 
vent. But, as was remarked before, the supremacy 
of Rome arrested and suppressed this entire work 
of publishing and propagating the Scriptures; and it 
was not until the Holy Spirit used the genius of 
Wiclif as an Angel of Revelation that the long- 
dormant Word arose and resumed its mission of 
enlightening the world. 

Once started on this career of diffusion, the Scrip- 
tures have known no rest. For the initial command 
of the Church, its original commission, "Go disciple 
all nations," involved unlimited publication of the 



238 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

Truth as its first condition. With the Reformation, 
the Bible was translated into the vernacular of every 
European people who accepted the Gospel. But 
it is noteworthy that the greatest progress of this 
work was reserved for the present age. It is esti- 
mated that in 1804 there were not more than five 
million copies of the Bible in existence in the world. 
Since then more than one hundred and sixty million 
copies have been published and scattered through 
the nations. This has been done by twelve great 
societies, in different countries, who have translated 
the Scriptures, wholly or in part, into more than 
four hundred languages and dialects, thirty-nine of 
which had no written form until Protestant mission- 
aries created it. 

Of the labor thus bestowed by Christian scholars 
we may form some conception when we learn that 
the Bengali version of Carey occupied fifteen years, 
the Burmese of Judson nineteen years, the Tahiti- 
an twenty years and the Dakota version of William- 
son and Riggs nearly forty years. And this work 
was not merely manual and intellectual, as in trans- 
posing ideas from one idiom or word into others. 
It often involved the creation of new terms in the 
vernacular to express truths that the native mind 
had never grasped. Think of finding the equiv- 



JOHN WICLIF 239 

alents of love, grace, holiness, in languages possess- 
ing perhaps a dozen different words for murder but 
not one to express gratitude or forgiveness. This 
labor has been performed by self-denying mission- 
aries of the Cross, and the Gospel has through them 
rendered a service to the cause of scholarship and 
civilization w^hich the highest linguistic talent in the 
world has recognized. Miiller and Whitney have 
acknowledged that no greater help could possibly 
have been rendered to the educational, literary and 
intellectual interests of the barbarous nations coming 
within the pale of civilization than by this gift of 
the Christian Scriptures to their vernacular. It is 
this work of Bible translation that has given to at 
least fifty savage races the beginning of their litera- 
ture, the first written speech, with its alphabet, spell- 
ing-book, dictionary, etc. 

And this wonderful process is going on with ever- 
increasing rapidity. Every improvement of the 
printing-press, every advance of comparative philol- 
ogy, every new discovery of antiquarian research 
and linguistic lore, gives new impulse and power to 
the propagation of the Christian Scriptures. In Wi- 
clif's day it required the labor of a scribe ten months 
to produce a copy of the Scriptures, and it would 
cost a laboring-man the fruits of twenty-five years 



240 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

of toil to purchase it. Now they are pubHshed at 
the rate of ten per minute through the year, and sold 
as cheaply as twenty-five cents per copy, and this 
among every nation and tribe yet reached by the Gos- 
pel in the world. What, then, shall we say to these 
things? 

First, the Bible is the on/i; Book of its kind that 
ever attempted such a work <3s this. None of the 
Sacred Books that form the Oracles of other relig- 
ions ever required or permitted a world-wide dis- 
persion of their contents. The works of Confucius 
and the Hindoo Vedas none of their votaries ever 
dreamed of giving to nations beyond themselves. 
Indeed the Koran is by express commandment rig- 
orously confined to the Arabic. The Word of God 
is the only book ever written that urges itself upon 
all nations. 

Second, the Bible is the only book of its kind that 
can stand universal translation. Even when render- 
ed into other languages, its rivals lose their virtue 
and power. The Oriental Scriptures that Arabians 
and Hindoos revere fall flat and vague upon the 
Occidental ear. We may admire the poetic phrase, 
the rich idea here and there, as we still read the 
words of Pythagoras and Plato. But as for a law 
of life, a manual of duty, what European or Amer- 



JOHN WICLIF 241 

ican could possibly accept the Zend Avesta or the 
Chinese classics? All of these authorities are local 
and limited; like the palm-tree or the bamboo, they 
do not bear transplanting, whereas the Bible flour- 
ishes equally in every zone and climate of the earth. 
It is a cosmopolitan book, as adjustable to the chilled 
thought of the Esquimaux as to the glowing fancy 
of the negro, as well suited to the refined culture of 
England as to the low grade of Indian Hfe. Is 
there in this no evidence of its origin? Could such 
a work have been born of any human age or race or 
was it begotten of the Omnipresent, Infinite Spirit of 
Truth? 

And as for its relation to the personal life and 
character of its readers, no words could utter all the 
testimony that has been rendered in its praise. From 
Dante and Milton to Goethe and Franklin, from 
Shakespeare to Wordsworth, from Handel and 
Haydn to Mendelssohn and Mozart, from Raphael 
and Da Vinci to West and Muncaczy, from New- 
ton even to Huxley, and from Cromwell to Grant 
and Lee, tributes of some kind have been rendered, 
more or less frequently, to the peculiar, inalienable 
primacy of this book. "There is but one book," 
said Scott, "the Bible." It was a favorite compan- 
ion of Abraham Lincoln. His biographer, Arnold, 



242 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

says, "He knew the Bible by heart. There was 
not a clergyman to be found so familiar with it as he. 
From it he acquired that clear, concise, Anglo- 
Saxon style that made him so effective in his ora- 
tions and writings." Yes, and from it also, we may 
say, he drew consciously or unconsciously that sub- 
lime devotion to Truth and Righteousness which 
qualified him to be the Moses of the new Exodus 
of our nation. 

The explorer, Stanley, says that when starting on 
his great journey across the Dark Continent he took 
with him quite a library of books; but during the 
vicissitudes of travel they gradually disappeared un- 
til there were left only Shakespeare, Carlyle, the 
Nautical Almanac and the Bible. These also 
wore away, one by one, until the only book that re- 
mained when he reached the sea was the Bible. We 
can hardly call this accidental. It was a clear case 
of the survival of the fittest. It was a picture of the 
way this wonderful book outlasts all others and alone 
stays by the soul unto the end. 

Yes, we may equip ourselves with all the libraries 
of earth and richly furnish the caravan of life with 
poetry, fiction, science, philosophy, history, but so 
surely as the long labors of time wear us away will 
these also fail us. Gradually we outgrow them and 



JOHN WICLIF 243 

leave them behind. The toils and troubles of ex- 
istence rob us of the delights of literature, and the 
sins and sorrows of the soul weaken to us the powers 
of culture ; and as our steps grow feebler toward the 
West, our hands grow emptier of the words of men, 
till at last we find ourselves forsaken of all their 
power to cheer, as life itself fails us. But when 
we near the final shore, where the dark ocean tells 
us that our journey at last is done, we too shall find 
that the Word of God abides, the one, the only book 
that can go with us out into the mysteries of the 
wide, wide sea that rolls around all the world. 




Luther and Erasmus 



AT about the time that America was discov- 
^ ered the rehgious aspect of Europe pre- 
I^K^. sented a very dreary scene. It was 
what is now called "the Dark Ages," 
so termed because of the almost universal 
prevalence of moral and intellectual gloom. 
For nearly seven hundred years the civilized 
world had been without the Gospel. Divine Truth 
had been buried, with the Book, in a language to 
the people unknown, and even the Latin version was 
rarely used by the learned. Christianity had been 
displaced by the Church. The Pope stood in the 
place of Jesus Christ, and Rome was what Jerusalem 
had once been. 

True, this usurpation had not been unchallenged. 
A protest had already been made by John Wiclif, 
who' in the fourteenth century, gave the Scriptures 
to the common people. With him indeed the Re- 
formation began, for he struck the spark that fired 
Huss in Bohemia and Jerome of Prague. But Wi- 
clif's great work was confined mainly to England. 
On the continent Romanism had not suffered great- 



246 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

ly from these attacks. Even in England the bones 
of Wiclif had been burned and cast into the stream 
in token of the land's repudiation of his teachings, 
and in Germany Huss and Jerome had perished at 
the stake. Then once more the night settled down, 
as it seemed forever. 

It is hardly possible for us now to realize the state 
of things then existing. To do so we must picture 
to ourselves Romanism in its most flagrant 
features omnipotent, not as now with us, 
soft-spoken, slow-stepping, apologetic; but Ro- 
manism enthroned and supreme, all-daring and 
intolerant. The Church was an ecclesiastical 
government, supreme over all secular powers. An 
Emperor had held the stirrup of a Pope, in sign of 
vassalage. Bishops outranked the nobles of any 
realm. More than one-half of the soil of Europe 
was owned by the religious orders. The clergy 
were an omnipresent army which obeyed no master 
but the Pontiff. They were amenable to no law 
but his, and they defied all other courts. Rome was 
supreme over all governments and climes. It was 
perfectly consistent with his other prerogatives that 
the Pope, on the discovery of America, claimed the 
entire undiscovered world as his own and dividing 
it gave the eastern half to Portugal and the western 



LUTHER AND ERASMUS 247 

to Spain. Also a great part of the administration 
of civil government was in the hands of the Church. 
No King could be crowned lawfully but by the 
Pope's representatives. No private will could be 
proven except before a Bishop or his officer. All 
such crimes as profligacy, drunkenness, cruelty, dis- 
honesty, must be tried at the bar of the Church. If 
the laws ordained by the Church ever conflicted with 
those of the State, the latter must give way, as Arch- 
bishop Warham plainly told the House of Commons 
in the fifteenth century. 

Now try to imagine such a state as this in every 
country of the so-called Christian world. Every- 
where the priest, at the birth and at the death, in 
the household and by the throne, on the battle-field 
and in the Court of Justice, — everywhere that sable 
presence and that ghostly power. Nothing blessed, 
nothing legal, nothing sure or safe without the mark 
of the Church. And all this in the service of Sin. 
Rome had undoubtedly rendered a great service to 
Europe during the convulsions following the dismem- 
berment of the ancient world, by establishing a neu- 
tral authority, a refuge, a court of appeal, where 
discord might be harmonized, learning sheltered and 
religion of some kind kept alive. lis record was 
bright with saintly names which still deserve the 



248 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

world's honor, and great good of certain kinds had 
been done by its many Orders ; but the day for such 
functions had long since passed, and in the fifteenth 
century Romanism was mainly ancient paganism 
revived, under christian forms, and intensified with 
new life. 

The Church contradicted itself. It forbade the 
eating of meat on fast-days, but for a certain sum 
would sell permission to do so. It consigned to 
perdition the unrepentant sinner, but agreed for a 
price to annul the sentence. Its courts, before 
which every layman might be summoned on any 
charge, became instruments of extortion, as the rec- 
ords remain to show. And what could be done 
against a power that wielded excommunication? No 
judge or king dared to interfere. Nothing but mon- 
ey might save the hapless victim. On the other hand, 
any criminal was safe from justice if once within a 
church door; and if a murderer could show an abil- 
ity to read, he was at once covered by the immunity 
belonging to the clergy. He was a "clerk" and 
must not die. Such was the Church of Rome; and 
yet we have not spoken of its worst features, — the 
shameless profligacy which at times prevailed among 
the religious orders, from a Pope who was a mur- 
derer down to Bishops and monks whose luxury and 



LUTHER AND ERASMUS 249 

licentiousness were a by-word among the people. 
Try to imagine such a mephitic moral atmosphere 
spread over Europe as the conditions of its religious 
life. 

Listen! You hear the ringing of a bell in Ger- 
man villages. It is followed by a loud voice pro- 
claiming a new Gospel — "Now is the accepted time! 
Now is the day of salvation!" As we draw near 
we see a red cross uplifted, and beside it a person in 
priestly garb offering for sale pardons and permis- 
sions for any kind of sin. Hearken to the very words 
of Tetzel, "This cross" (pointing to his red stan- 
dard) "has as much efficacy as the cross of Jesus 
Christ. I would not exchange my privileges for 
those of St. Peter in heaven, for I have saved more 
souls with my indulgences than he with his sermons." 
All this in the name of Holy Church and the Son 
of God! And so common, popular and successful 
was this traffic in indulgences in the year 1510 that 
the great Basilica of St. Peter's at Rome was com- 
pleted by the help of funds thus raised. 

If it be asked how the spiritual life of Medieval 
Christendom could have fallen so low as to permit 
or encourage so shameful a vice as this, it should be 
remembered what was the cost and fate of opposition 
to Rome in those times. Many voices had been 



250 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

raised in protest, many lives had been devoted to the 
truth, but alas for the results ! The snows of Alpine 
gorges reddened with the blood of Albigenses, fire- 
scorched spots on many a German meadow and 
Spanish square ; deep, dark crypts of Inquisition tor- 
ture, could testify on that point. It was a desperate 
task to resist or resent Rome in the fifteenth cen- 
tury. And so it would have been to this day. We 
should now be helplessly enslaved in the bonds of 
superstition, this land of light and liberty what Italy 
is in respect to a knowledge of saving truth, but for 
the fact that the errors of Romanism were detected 
and denounced by many Protestants, pioneers of 
a better day. It is to the variant characters and 
methods of two of these reformers that I would now 
invite attention. 

Desiderius Erasmus became known to the world 
at about the time that Columbus discovered America. 
He was then a young man of great learning, wit and 
varied accomplishments. Born of lowly Dutch 
parents at Rotterdam, he had been early placed at 
school in a monastery, where he took orders after- 
ward as a monk. This was at that time often the 
only possible course for those who desired a thorough 
education. Thus situated he rapidly acquired a 
profound acquaintance with all the learning of his 



LUTHER AND ERASMUS 251 

day. Soon after leaving the retirement of the clois- 
ter, he appeared in public life as the companion and 
adviser of princes. His brilliant talents and vast 
erudition recommended him both to political and 
scholastic circles everywhere. In England he be- 
came a favorite at the court of Henry the Eighth, 
and was the chosen companion of Cardinal Wolsey 
and Sir Thomas More. He had wealth at com- 
mand, and the highest patronage in letters and art. 
Yet he was not spoiled by prosperity, but passed 
through the dissipations of the time a calm, studious, 
upright man. Such a keen, true mind as this must 
have seen right through the shams of the prevalent 
religion. And so it did. All of the pretended mi- 
racles performed by the clergy, cures effected by 
bits of the true cross, or bones of the saints, blessings 
bestowed by images, magic virtues of holy wells and 
the like, were smiled at by Erasmus as ridiculous; 
while the open profligacy of monks and nuns, the 
corruptions of ecclesiastical courts, the abuse of pen- 
ances and the sale of indulgences, were detested and 
denounced by him. Nor was he open to the seduc- 
tions of power. The court of Rome did its utmost 
to enslave him, but failed. While he was in great 
favor with the ecclestiastical authorities, he was in 
nothing their tool. He saw clearly the fatal abuses 



252 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

of the Church and he had a judgment strong enough 
and a conscience pure enough to show him his duty 
in the case. 

Now let us see just what this wise, witty, sincere 
lover of good did toward the great end of reforming 
religion. He saw the evil: how would he rectify 
it? In a characteristic and notable manner. His 
main reliance was on human agencies. He assumed 
the work of correcting customs and institutions. He 
appealed to the intellect and his method was chiefly 
negative. He believed that if priests and laymen 
would give up certain abuses and set about certain 
reforms all would go well. But there must be no 
violence or excitement. Extremes were perilous and 
all appeals to popular feeling must be avoided. Thus 
Erasmus, the scholar, the man of the world. Such 
was his prescription for the mortal plague of the 
times. Yet he was sincere and in earnest. He 
meant well, and in some respects he rendered good 
service to the Truth. We owe to him the Greek 
New Testament which he rescued from its tomb in 
the cloisters, an inestimable gift, fully as valuable 
as the translations by Wiclif and Luther of the Bible 
into the vernacular. For it is as important for us 
to know the Scriptures in their original form as to 
possess them in our own tongue. Erasmus was there- 



LUTHER AND ERASMUS 253 

fore the first of that long hne of scholars who have 
expounded and developed divine truth by the help 
of classic learning. 

He was also very active in his appeals to the 
Church authorities for reform. No one can read 
his letters to the clergy without admiring his courage 
and purity. He wrote to the Pope, "Let each man 
amend first his own wicked life. When he has done 
that and will amend his neighbor, let him put on 
Christian charity, which is severe enough where se- 
verity is needed." This was new and bold lan- 
guage in a persecuting age. Again, to an Arch- 
bishop, "Unless I have a pure heart I shall not see 
God. But a man is not condemned because he can- 
not tell whether the Spirit has one principle or two. 
Has he the fruits of the Spirit? This is the ques- 
tion." This too was an unusual position to take in 
an age of dogmatism. As also when he urged an- 
other, "Leave everyone free to believe what he 
pleases. When you have done this, you can correct 
the abuses of which the world with good reason com- 
plains. Do not shut your eyes to the cries of those 
for whom Christ died. He died not for the great 
only but for the poor and the lowly." 

Thus spoke the open-minded thinker in a lan- 
guage far ahead of his day. His advice was sound. 



254 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

well-conceived and expressed, true and timely; but 
was it adequate to the needs of the case? Would 
such words alone have brought on the Reformation? 
Did they really touch the actual sore or present a 
proper remedy? No. Erasmus had no conception 
of the actual nature and needs of the situation that 
he deplored. His diagnosis of the case was but 
superficial and his prescription correspondingly in- 
adequate. The same may be said of the Old Cath- 
olic movement, which has risen and declined in our 
own day. With all of the wisdom and pure intent 
of Dollinger and Hyacinthe, it has already appeared 
that by simply aiming at the correction of abuses on 
the part of Rome and a restoration of the primitive 
order, their enterprise is quite unequal to its purpose. 
No mere rectification can ever suffice to purge the 
nature of Anti-Christ. 

But the trouble with Erasmus was that he did not 
find in his own experience and disposition the start- 
ing-point of true reform. He had no personal ac- 
quaintance with saving truth. He found in his own 
soul no inspiration of the Holy Spirit. His plan of 
reform was that of outer correction, not of inner 
renewal. Hence he could not detect or displace 
the moral malady that was ravaging the world. He 
had a treatment for the sinner but none for sin. And 



LUTHER AND ERASMUS 255 

for the same reason, he lacked the spirit and force of 
a genuine reformer. Having no deep resources of 
spirituaHty within him, he could not furnish the cour- 
age, persistency, self-sacrifice, which the true soldier 
must exert in the battle against wrong. According- 
ly, as soon as his just and severe criticisms began to 
arouse anger and provoke resentment, he began to 
hesitate. For he knew and feared, while he de- 
nounced the power of the priests. "Beware how 
you offend the monks. You have to do with an 
enemy that never dies." And when it came to fa- 
cing Tetzel, and substantiating his charges against 
the purple Cardinal, Erasmus had no mind for the 
task. 

This he confessed. When the storm that had 
been gathering its electric wrath for ages broke over 
Europe he shrank and fled before it. So he wrote 
to Archbishop Warham : "As for me, I have no in- 
clination to risk my life for the truth. We have not 
all the strength for martyrdom, and if trouble comes 
I shall imitate Saint Peter." Such was his last re- 
sort; casting behind him his scholarly protests and 
wise prescriptions, he sought shelter within the very 
institutions he denounced. In spite of conscience 
and reason, he chose the side of wrong ; for he loved 
the praise of men more than the praise of God. Said 



256 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

he : "Popes and Emperors must decide matters. I ac- 
cept what is good and do what I can with the rest. 
Peace on any terms is better than the justest war." 
Thus came to an end the reformation which Erasmus 
proposed. 

When the storm of religious convulsion, of which 
we have spoken, broke over Europe, there was one 
man exposed to it who did not cringe or flee before 
it. Let us look now at the contrast between Eras- 
mus and Martin Luther. He was born sixteen years 
later than his distinguished contemporary, but like 
him, was of lowly parentage, was educated in a 
monastery, and received by a religious order as a 
monk at an early age. To this, his chosen career, 
he gave himself with complete consecration. He 
became distinguished in the cloister for his religious 
zeal. And while he never acquired the extensive 
and polished learning of Erasmus, he had what the 
other had not, an intense moral earnestness and a 
heroic self-forgetfulness. To him principle was ev- 
erything, policy nothing. He was, therefore, as a 
Romanist, an absorbed devotee. As he afterward 
wrote, "If any poor monk could have entered Heav- 
en by his own exertions, surely I would have done 
so." His fidelity to the Church was absolute and 
extreme. "So great was the Pope in my esteem that 



LUTHER AND ERASMUS 257 

I accounted the least deviation from him a sin; and 
to defend his authority I would have kindled the 
flames to burn the heretics and should have believed 
that I was thereby showing the truest obedience to 
God." Do you not hear in all this an echo from the 
life of Saul of Tarsus? The two men were cast in 
the same mold. 

But through all this troublous experience Father 
Martin was being led by the Spirit in a way that he 
knew not. The moral corruptions which Erasmus 
detected in society at large Luther first recognized in 
his own heart. And here is the radical difference 
between those two characters, a variation which ex- 
plains every other divergence. The one began at 
the branch, the other at the root. Luther attempted 
nothing for others until his own soul was at peace 
with God. Erasmus was from first to last a critic 
and an adviser of other men. Hence the former's 
appeal to the world was from heart to heart, and had 
all the tremendous force of personal experience; 
while the latter's approach was from the outside to 
the outside, a superficial treatment which could not 
reach the depths. The one was God's way, and He 
honored it. The other was man's, and it came to 
naught. 



258 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

Every one knows the thrilling story of Luther's 
final emergence into the light. It is one of the most 
romantic episodes in religious history. The enthu- 
siast goes to Rome as to the gate of heaven. And 
there in his passionate zeal he will perform every act 
of abasement and devotion for the glory of God; 
when, lo, as he is painfully making his way on his 
knees up Pilate's staircase in one of the churches, 
the voice of God proclaims to his soul the Gospel 
**The just shall live b^ faith." He hears and yields. 
In one flash of light he sees the Truth, and the 
Truth makes him free. Then, instantly arising, he 
turns away forever from the superstitions of the 
Church, and goes forth to tell the world of the Sal- 
vation he has found. 

Was it not a case of poetic justice that the grand 
crusade against Anti-Christ should thus be inaugu- 
rated at the heart of Rome, finding occasion for its 
birth in the very rites and ceremonies on which the 
Church relied for its support > How similar this to 
the sudden arrest and transformation of Saul, whose 
persecuting career was chosen by Providence as the 
means by which he should be converted to the Cross 
he had opposed. When Luther, thus delivered 
from bondage and made free in Christ, retired to his 
home in Germany, he met the same abuses that Eras- 



LUTHER AND ERASMUS 259 

mus had already begun to condemn. But mark the 
difference between the methods of the two men. 
Luther did not resort to writing caustic letters to the 
dignitaries of the Church and arousing public opin- 
ion to the false and ludicrous aspects of the case. 
No. As soon as Tetzel's red cross was lifted in his 
neighborhood and the sale of indulgences began, he 
spoke right out. "That is wrong! The Pope has 
no power to remit penalties inflicted by God. To 
hope to be saved by indulgences is to hope in lies and 
vanities/' Those words expanded at length he pub- 
lished in the shape of ninety-five Theses, which he 
posted on the door of the church at Wittenberg, Oc- 
tober 31, 1 5 1 7, an act equivalent to printing them in 
a popular newspaper at the present time. 

And at once an explosion followed. For here 
was a sharp attack on the very heart of the Church, 
its greed for money; and it soon appeared that to 
expostulate with learned doctors was one thing but 
to interfere with the income of the Holy Father was 
quite another. Rome could tolerate the former with 
patience, but not for one moment should the latter 
be allowed. This explains the difference between 
the manner in which the protests of Erasmus were 
treated and the way in which Luther's opposition 
was regarded. Tetzel gave the alarm, and it ran 



260 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

like wildfire along the priestly lines. Replies, re- 
bukes, warnings, threats, were hurled against the 
profane innovator from every side. Luther himself 
was astonished at the tumult, but his courage rose 
with the occasion, and he returned blow for blow. 
One step led to another until he found himself in- 
volved in opposition to most of the doctrines of the 
Church and at hot war with its ablest defenders, 
something he had never dreamed of when he uttered 
his first protest. But he had only one weapon and 
one plan. He judged all things in the light of a 
spiritually-renewed heart and by the standard of the 
Word of God. His position was therefore at once 
defensive and aggressive, and equally strong in either 
case. To arguments, blandishments, denunciations, 
he returned one answer: "Show me from the Scrip- 
tures that I am wrong, and I will retract ; otherwise. 
never." 

Divine Providence soon raised up for him influen- 
tial friends among the German rulers, and Rome was 
therefore compelled to treat him without violence. 
In Italy, France or Spain, he would have been sent 
to the stake in short order. But nothing that could 
be done to intimidate him was neglected. Said a 
purple Cardinal to him: "What do you think the 
Pope cares for the opinion of a German boor? His 



LUTHER AND ERASMUS 261 

little finger is stronger than all Germany. Do you 
expect princes to take up arms and defend you? I 
tell you No! And where will you be then?" Said 
the hero simply, "Then as now, in the hands of Al- 
mighty God." Yes, there he was, and there he re- 
mained. The Pope excommunicated him, and he 
burned the Bull in the great square at Wittenberg. 
He was summoned to appear before the Emperor at 
Worms, and although warned of the fate of Huss, 
he walked resolutely into the lion's mouth. ''Go to 
Worms? I Tvill go if there are as man]; devils in 
Worms as tiles on the roofs of the houses." And 
into the midst of the stately Council he walked, a 
brown-frocked monk, all alone, amid armored 
knights and crimson prelates, and the gorgeous re- 
tinue of the court, — one man against the world. It 
was demanded that he should retract his heretical 
words and disavow all enmity toward the Pope. 
But, looking Charles the Fifth, lord of half the earth, 
full in the face, he replied: "Since your Imperial 
Highness desires a direct answer, I will give one, and 
it is this. Unless I shall be convinced by the testi- 
mony of Scripture or by clear and plain argument, I 
cannot retract. Here I stand, I can do no otherwise. 
God help me. Amen ! " 



262 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

These words fire our cheeks as we hear them — a 
blast of defiance, a clarion note from the very trump 
of God ! But as to how they sounded in that grand 
conclave, we can hardly imagine. Then and there, 
it was the extreme audacity of one lone man whose 
very weakness was his glory. Yes, even so. In 
just that way did the Son of God appear, in his lorn 
case before Pilate. Thus did Peter and John look, 
as they were arraigned before the High Priests, and 
Paul as he confronted Agrippa. At the time, it is 
always so with God's champions. Not until after- 
ward does the grandeur of their position dawn upon 
the world. All the more credit to them, therefore, 
as their trial of faith is the greater. 

Such was the way in which Luther met the awful 
crisis that he had aroused. He threw his own life 
into the chasm that he had opened, to bridge the 
abyss. Never did soldier on battle-field stand at 
the front with more absolute self-exposure. And 
yet he did not court the danger or glory in it. There 
was no bravado or recklessness about him. Indeed, 
his private records show that he was at first appalled 
by the storm which he had aroused, and was contin- 
ually distressed by the difficulties before him. His 
nature was naturally sensitive, and his disposition 
modest. He was very diffident as to his own merits, 



LUTHER AND ERASMUS 263 

so much so that his friends had to force him into the 
pulpit. He shrank with pain from the role of the 
reformer. "God does not conduct, but drives me 
and carries me forward. I am not master of my 
own actions. I would gladly live in peace, but I 
am cast into the midst of tumult and change." At 
times he fainted under his burdens, was once on the 
eve of fleeing to France, at another time offered to 
come to terms with the Pope on certain conditions: 
so human was he, so weak the flesh. But none of 
this inward depression ever appeared, or for any 
length of time, on the surface. With every new 
occasion he showed himself a strong, stern warrior, 
who feared nothing and spared nothing, — his very 
words half-battles, and every act a stroke of the 
sword. He would spend the night in groans and 
tears, lying prone on the floor in utter prostration; 
but with the morning he came forth, pale and feeble, 
yet calm and terrible with the very strength of God. 
And that very weakness was his power. As Jesus 
had his Gethsemane, and Paul his thorn in the 
flesh, so Luther must suffer in order to prevail. Eras- 
mus knew nothing of that inner anguish, and there- 
fore he never won the heights of triumph. It is only 
to those who die with Christ that His life of glory 
is given. That Luther had grasped this secret of 



264 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

the Lord appears from his own words, "I have 
known all along that I should present an offense to 
the Jew and a folly to the Greek, but I hope that I 
am a debtor to Jesus Christ, who saith to me also 
'I will show him how great things he must suffer for 
My name's sake!' I know that the Word of Christ 
from the beginning of the world hath been of such 
a sort that he who would maintain it must with the 
Apostles forsake and renounce all things and stand 
waiting for death every hour. If it were not so, it 
would not be the Word of Christ. It was preached 
with death, it was promulgated with death, it hath 
been maintained with death, and must be so here- 
after." 

Our Savior said: "Whosoever will save his life 
shall lose it ; but whosoever shall lose his life for mv 
sake and the Gospel's, the same shall save it." Let 
us see how these words were fulfilled in the fortunes 
of the two men we have been observing. Erasmus 
could not bear to lose his life. His supreme end 
was self-preservation. While he earnestly desired 
the purification of the Church and the correction of 
the abuses of his time, he was not willing to sacrifice 
himself, in order to secure these objects. But it 
came to pass that in endeavoring to abolish evil and 
at the same time to secure his own safety, he failed 



LUTHER AND ERASMUS 265 

in both. His prescription of outward change for 
the radical wrongs of the Church only aggravated 
the disease. By mending an old garment with un- 
fulled cloth, he made the rent worse. And not only 
so, but his course re-acted upon himself. By trying 
to be impartial between the conservatives and the 
radicals of his day, he offended both sides. "I am 
a poor actor," he cried. "I prefer to be a spectator 
at the play." But the first scholar of the age could 
not do this, especially after he had helped to kindle 
the fire. The battle was joined and neutrality was 
impossible. In vain did the well-meaning but timid 
soul stand between the two armies, crying "Peace." 
The Romanists blamed him for not denouncing the 
heretics, and the Protestants distrusted him for not 
condemning the Pope. He kept on writing letters 
full of good advice, but his words were wasted on 
the whirlwind. His influence steadily declined, un- 
til old age found him with no friends on either side. 
"Every goose now hisses at Erasmus," said he. And 
so he died, disappointed and ashamed, a man who 
might have been to the Reformation its peerless ex- 
positor as Luther was its redoubtable champion ; but 
who, through fear of endangering himself, grieved 
the Spirit, lost his opportunity, and defeated his own 



266 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

projects. As it is written, "He that seeketh his Hfe 
shall lose it." 

On the other hand, the simple monk who lost 
himself in the cause of God and would abate nothing 
of his self-sacrifice, who gave up all for the Truth, 
and shrank not irom the uttermost outlay, — that man 
in losing his life, verily found it. Martin Luther 
was not an ideal reformer. He made many mis- 
takes, and his work needed correction by other 
hands. He was choleric and extreme at times, in- 
tolerant toward those who differed from him, and he 
never outgrew certain old errors, such as the union 
of Church and State, and the real presence of Christ 
in the Sacraments. But as a pioneer, a soldier lead- 
ing a forlorn hope, he fulfilled his mission. Before 
his death, Luther saw himself the recognized and 
triumphant champion of the Gospel, to awaken Eu- 
rope. He saw the Truth which he had nailed like 
a challenge to the church door spreading thence over 
the whole of Christendom. He lived to witness his 
own loved German land freed from ecclesiastical 
tyranny and hailing him its deliverer. He won for 
himself the fear of his foes, the love of his friends, 
the respect of all. And from glory he has since 
beheld his cause broaden out into the whole world 
and his name ranking next to those of the Apostles 



LUTHER AND ERASMUS 



267 



on the roll of Christian honor: according as it is 
written, ''Whoso shall lose his life for mp saf^e and 
the CospeUs, the same shall save it." 





JOHN KNOX 



John Knox and Mary Queen 
of Scots 



GOOD and Evil are never so distinct and im- 
pressive as when incarnate in human char- 
acter and hfe. The great antagonism by 
which they fill the moral world with con- 
fusion is most emphatically expressed in the contrasts 
which history presents through its great tableaux of 
human collision. Moses confronting Pharaoh, David 
and Goliath, Daniel and Nebuchadnezzar, John 
Baptist accusing Herod, Jesus arraigned before 
Pilate, Paul at the tribunal of Nero — these are the 
most dramatic presentations of the immortal contest 
between Truth and Error. 

It is to one of these historic battles that attention 
is now invited, — the romantic, the tragic, story of the 
contrast presented by John Knox and Mary Queen 
of Scots. 

That man and that woman stand forever opposed 
to each other in the most picturesque scene which 
Scotland, the most romantic country in Europe, has 
presented. They met and defied each other at one 
of the great crises of modern history. It was when 



270 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

the wonderful change known as the Reformation, in 
the Sixteenth Century, was rolling like an earthquake 
through the nations of Christendom and altering the 
moral configuration of the face of the earth. Ger- 
many, France, the Netherlands, and England had 
experienced the strange upheaval and depression 
which the Gospel wrought in society, elevating new 
elements and overturning long established institutions, 
casting down the mighty and exalting them of low 
degree, according to its immemorial method. 

This religious revolution reached Scotland last 
of all. There it found a people as peculiar as the 
climate and the scenery of that gray and gallant 
country of the North. For the highlands and the 
lowlands, the misty mountains and the flowery dells, 
the crag and the gorge, the burn and the brae, which 
fill the land with picturesque variety, are emblematic 
of the Scottish character and history. Scotland has 
ever been the home of Romance. Poets and sages 
have vied with warriors and kings to give that north- 
ern realm a dramatic celebrity. There the gloom 
of Ossian's heroes rests darkly on the hills, while the 
genius of Scott and the melody of Burns have robed 
the land with the ideality of fiction and poesy. To 
this day there is no historic spirit so intense and pecu- 
liar as that of Scotia's children. 



JOHN KNOX 271 

In the middle ages nowhere else did feudalism 
flourish so bravely and endure so long as in ancient 
Caledonia. There chieftain and clan maintained 
their devoted relation, and the castle and the cabin 
kept up their interdependence as in no other land. 
Long after the romance of Chivalry had died out 
among other peoples, the sword and spear, the tourn- 
ament and foray, were common and popular with 
the Scotch. Their history was therefore perpetually 
embroiled with wars and confusion: personal feuds 
and party conflicts raged unchecked. The Kings 
of Scotland were but the nominal heads of a realm 
in which the nobility were perpetually at war with 
each other, and political debates were always settled 
by the sword. A poor and barren soil, a harsh cli- 
mate, and unsettled industrial conditions, developed 
in the people a brave, hardy and belligerent spirit 
which has given to their descendants to this day the 
forceful and prevailing temper that always character- 
izes them. They were hardly a nation in the six- 
teenth century; rather a collection of conflicting ele- 
ments not yet fused together by any unifying princi- 
ple. Nor had religion exercised an ameliorating 
power. Romanism, omnipotent in Europe during 
the Middle Ages, had been supreme in Scotland, but 
with even worse results than elsewhere. Nowhere, 



272 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

except in Italy was the established church so corrupt 
and so shameless. It held in its grasp the larger 
share of the wealth of the kingdom; and the lives 
of its prelates and priests were notorious for their 
proud and rapacious character. To crown and con- 
firm all these distressing conditions, there was the per- 
petual rivalry with England, which kept the border 
of the two kingdoms in a chronic state of antagon- 
ism, while a close alliance and sympathy with France 
rendered the Scotch people infused with foreign 
ideas and elements which were a source of endless 
political and moral confusion. 

But at last the time came for a change. The new 
era of religious liberty and reform which had dawned 
upon the world, and was making all things new, 
began to cast its beams through the Northern dark- 
ness and waken the germs of greatness which were 
slumbering in Scotia's heart. Wiclif and his follow- 
ers, the Lollards, had scattered the seeds of Bible 
truth across the border; Luther and Calvin had kin- 
dled fires and set in motion forces on the Continent 
whose influence was felt by the Tweed and the Tay. 
These new principles found congenial conditions 
awaiting them, and soon the times were ripe for 
Protestantism in Scotland. The Hierarchy was 
alarmed at the sudden imperilment of its time-honor- 



JOHN KNOX 273 

ed strength, and the rack, the dungeon and the stake 
began to do their dreadful work of repression. But 
Scotchmen have never yielded to violence. The 
defense of their rights is with them a traditional pride 
and Rome soon found that the old spirit of bag-pipe 
and claymore could be as active and fierce in the 
religious as in the political arena. 

All of these antecedents and environments must 
be taken into account by those who would read 
aright the story of the Reformation in Scotland. It 
necessarily partook of the stormy character of all 
Scottish history. Its course was marked by the na- 
tional qualities of stern self-assertion, extreme rigor 
and unsparing thoroughness. On the one hand was 
the Established Church, landed and lordly with the 
privileges of ages, deep rooted in the soil and accus- 
tomed to absolute supremacy; on the other was the 
fierce spirit of individualism, the irascible, pugnacious 
propensity of a race which made of the true faith a 
crusade as determined as that which had led their 
ancestors to the Holy Sepulchre. These two oppos- 
ing forces found their respective champions in the 
persons of those representative characters whom some 
have called the Elijah and the Jezebel of modern 
time. 



274 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

John Knox was a child of the common people, 
born of the sturdy yeoman class, like Luther; but 
like him devoted early to the cause of culture, from 
which he received a liberal education. As the 
church in that age was the main refuge of all schol- 
ars, he became a priest, and until his fortieth year 
served the church faithfully, although rather as a 
man of letters than as an ecclesiastic. But by this 
time the fires of persecution which had consumed 
such a martyr as Patrick Hamilton, a young noble 
who had brought from Germany the reformer's faith, 
and George Wishart, another Scottish youth who 
had been converted in England through the heroic 
testimony of Latimer, — these terrible revelations of 
the real animus of Romanism, startled John Knox 
and compelled him to face the problem of his per- 
sonal duty. 

He did so, and therein received the commission of 
the Holy Spirit to become an apostle of the Truth, 
the champion of the Right for Scotland. The same 
voice which summoned the Tishbite from his home 
in the wilderness and commissioned him to proclaim 
t^e Word of the Lord to Ahab, made of Knox the 
Eliiah of Scotland. Like all of the Divine selec- 
tions, this choice was well made. If ever a hero's 
soul was lodged in a man's body, the fire of heroism 



JOHN KNOX 275 

was kindled in this Scotchman's life. In him the 
stern quahties of a warHke race were consecrated 
to the christian service. The age demanded a mil- 
itary religion. Nothing but a bold and brave faith 
could hold its own against the cruel might of domi- 
nant Romanism. A crusade must be preached. Be- 
lievers must take to themselves the whole armor of 
God and endure hardship as good soldiers of Jesus 
Christ, for the battle was the Lord's, The critics 
of our milder age who find fault with the stern rigors 
of Puritan, Huguenot, or Covenanter, do not make 
allowance for the difference of environment. If the 
reformers of the sixteenth century had not been war- 
riors, willing to do and dare for God, there would 
not now be the age of sweetness and light that we 
enjoy. 

John Knox therefore must be estimated by the 
standard of his time. It was his to play the part of 
Elijah. He must organize the discouraged friends 
of God, inspire them with courage, lead them against 
the fortified strength of a great enemy and make of 
his own person their champion. This he did. His 
pulpit at St. Giles became the very oracle of the 
Gospel to men. His thundering eloquence reverber- 
ated through Edinboro. Again and again he thrill- 
ed all Scotland with his passionate appeals. For 



276 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

he knew what Romanism was. After his first ap- 
pearance as a preacher, forced against his will into 
publicity by his friends, as Calvin was urged into 
prominence at Geneva, he had been seized by the 
French allies of the priesthood, and taken with oth- 
ers as a prisoner to France. There he had been 
condemned to the dreadful fate of the galleys, where 
he had been chained to the oar and lashed as a slave 
during three years of suffering and toil. If he had 
been willing to kiss an image of the Virgin Mary, he 
might have been released; but he spurned the temp- 
tation away with all a Scotchman's defiant courage. 
He escaped at last, but he never lost sight of that 
terrible experience. The iron sank into his soul, and 
doubtless helped to make him the fierce, almost fa- 
natical foe to the Papacy which he afterwards be- 
came. And when it is remembered that the Mas- 
sacre of St. Bartholomew occurred during the course 
of his ministry, shaking all Protestant Europe with 
a horror of fear and wrath, we can understand why 
the reformers of Scotland were so much more ex- 
treme than those of England and Germany. Knox 
and his followers were inspired with a personal and 
embittered hatred of Romanism, for which they had 
good reason ; and it was this exasperated spirit which 
led to the total demolition of Romish structures in 



JOHN KNOX 277 

the land. The splendid churches, noble monasteries 
sculptured shrines and all the architectural wealth 
of ages were swept away with a fury which seems 
ruthless and needless to those who do not see what 
provocation had been given by the church to its ene- 
mies in that age. Knox felt this. He looked back 
to Elijah and found in him precedent and authority 
for his own iconoclastic zeal. The Old Testament 
prophets were the christian model of that time and 
Joshua exterminating the Canaanites, Samuel hewing 
Agag in pieces, Elijah putting the four hundred 
priests of Baal to death, were the divine ideals of 
the Scotch reformers. 

Let them be judged in the light of the obstacles 
they encountered and the results which they reached. 
If since that day Scotland has never been encumber- 
ed with elaborate ritualism in the shape of an estab- 
lished Episcopacy, which has been such a burden 
to the true faith in England; if it has not been op- 
pressed by the lifeless scholasticism which has been 
the bane of Lutheranism in Germany ; if the churches 
north of the Tweed have been characterized by 
sound orthodoxy, a firm simplicity and an ardent 
spiritual power, it is because John Knox made such 
clean work of it in the great revolution he effected. 
Sparing nothing in his fiery expulsion of false religion 



278 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

and pitiless in his treatment of all who differed from 
him, he made many mistakes. He gave occasion 
to his enemies then and to his critics ever since to 
show how faulty he was in temper and method. He 
cannot be defended for much that he did nor admired 
for all that he said. But he had Ahab and the 
priests of Baal against him then, and his country has 
never had to fight them since his day. 

Now let us confine our attention to one of the 
many battles that this Elijah fought. There was 
one particular encounter which he himself feared (if 
he ever did fear anything) more than any other, and 
the fame of which has thrown a glamour of romance 
about his stern history, such as seems as strange to 
it as a wreath of fragrant flowers around a keen and 
massive battle-axe. When John Knox met Mary 
Queen of Scots, he reached the climax of his career 
as a reformer. For that woman represented, she 
embodied, the spirit of Romanism as no one else in 
Scotland could have done at that time. She has 
been called the Jezebel of Scotland, but with a li- 
cense which must be explained. The haughty, 
fierce and bloodthirsty temper of Ahab's wife cannot 
be said to have reappeared in Mary Stuart. That 
animus might be found in Mary of England, the 
Tudor Queen whose reign was black with the smoke 



JOHN KNOX 279 

of the martyr fires of Smithfield. The Scottish 
queen was of another spirit in her advocacy of Ro- 
manism. Hers was the power of beauty, grace and 
skill devoted to the false faith: all the more to be 
feared and resisted for that reason. She might be 
called Jezebel with this understanding, that she was 
the most formidable foe that Scotland's Elijah met, 
her weapons more subtle and her warfare more in- 
tense than any other of Rome's champions had 
brought against him. And in saying this we know 
that we are opening again one of the ever to be dis- 
puted questions and never to be solved problems of 
modern history. What was the truth about Mar^ 
Queen of Scots? 

For the most opposite and opposing replies are at 
once made to this immemorial query. The moral 
character, personal worth and official place of that 
royal lady have been the theme of interminable dis- 
cussion since her day. She has been attacked more 
violently and defended more vigorously than any 
other name in her country's annals. Historians, 
novelists and poets have taken sides for or against 
her memory with such effect that the world's verdict 
is still in abeyance. Let us hear an outline of her 
case as it has been argued in the court of historic 
criticism. 



280 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

First, the advocates of Mary Stuart make this plea 
in her favor. She was the most amiable, accom- 
plished and unfortunate woman of her time. The 
daughter of James the Fifth, one of that long line of 
Stuart kings who were from first to last attended by 
the most perverse fate that ever haunted a dynasty, 
she fully shared the ill-fortune of her race. Her 
father dying during her childhood, she was sent to 
her mother's kindred in France, where at the royal 
court she inhaled the atmosphere of intrigue and 
moral corruption for which it was famous. This 
was her initial misfortune, for which she was in no 
wise blamable. Her French training unfitted her 
for a life in the colder clime of Scotland, where re- 
ligion, politics and society were formed on a harder 
model and were inspired with very different ideals. 
It was not her fault that she could not perfectly adapt 
herself to the rigorous habits of a people who for the 
same reason were unable to make allowance for her 
foreign ways. They condemned many things in 
Mary Stuart which were due purely to the Romish 
and French spirit of her age. She was beautiful in 
person, vivacious in temper, gifted with rare powers 
of thought and conversation. Her education had 
been so carefully conducted that she was at an early 
age surprisingly forward in classic culture. Grace- 



JOHN KNOX 281 

ful alike in physique and intellect, she combined the 
most delicate feminine accomplishments with a vigor, 
courage and tenacity which were masculine and roy- 
al. This is admitted by friend and foe alike. It 
must be remembered also that the realm to whose 
throne she was called at the age of nineteen was one 
of the most turbulent in Christendom. It had always 
been hard to govern, with its intestine strife of war- 
ring nobles and hostile factions. But at the time of 
her accession, the new element of religious strife had 
embittered all of the old discord. The reformers 
were rapidly driving the Romish element to despera- 
tion. It would have required the wisdom of an 
Elizabeth and the power of a Henry the Eighth to 
preside in peace over such a chaotic nation. What 
wonder then that the young, inexperienced, ardent 
woman failed at such a crisis, made mistakes because 
of the false counsel of designing friends, and fell at 
last a victim to wrongs and catastrophes which she 
could not have prevented? Thus Mary Stuart has 
been defended by apologists who insist upon her rare 
good qualities as showing what she might have been 
if the malign fate of her position had not doomed her 
to destruction. 

But now let the other side of the case be heard. 
Stated in briefest terms the indictment is terrible for 



282 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

its plain facts and logical inferences. A young wo- 
man comes to the throne of her fathers, bringing with 
her a religion which she knows to be alien to the state 
she is to rule. She at once makes of herself an ad- 
vocate of Rome, and defiantly sets up its worship in 
her own palace, notwithstanding the protests of all 
her leading subjects. More than this, she admits to 
a very questionable intimacy a foreigner who is a 
bigoted Romanist, in the pay of a foreign court ; and 
this in spite of the objections of her own husband, 
Darnly, a Scottish noble. So extreme is this favorit- 
ism that it results in the murder of Rizzio in her very 
presence ; whereupon she threatens her husband with 
vengeance for the deed, in which he had taken part. 
After an apparent reconciliation to Darnly, she is 
the means of drawing him in his illness to a place 
where he meets with a violent death from unknown 
hands. She makes no attempt to find and punish 
the author of the deed, but actually marries the one 
who is most suspected as the perpetrator of the crime, 
within a short time after its occurrence. All this is 
a record of facts which are undeniable. And when 
the historian adds that so universal and bitter was the 
resentment of the Scotch people at this mjsuse of 
their royalty that a revolution soon drove the Queen 
from her throne and forced her to exile in England, 



JOHN KNOX 283 

where after years of captivity she perished on the 
scaffold, meeting a cruel fate which only political 
complications could have inflicted, it is contended 
that no more need be said. If ever a ruler failed 
criminally, and brought upon the throne a righteous 
retribution, this was the case with Mary Queen of 
Scots. 

We are not called on to decide between these con- 
flicting pleas. Perhaps it would be impossible to 
render a just verdict in a case which has been de- 
bated so often, and with such opposite results, for the 
past three hundred years. The fact is that in this as 
in other similar instances the opinions of men are 
largely determined by their point of view and med- 
ium of observation. Those who favor the cause of 
royalty and religious conservativism will continue to 
find in it reason for regarding Mary Stuart as more 
sinned against than sinning; while the friends of re- 
formation in church and state will never cease to dis- 
trust, if not condemn, the beautiful enchantress whom 
they call Jezebel. 

We may be permitted, however, to advance a 
theory which seems to reconcile the conflicting con- 
ditions of this perplexing subject. Let it be granted 
that Queen Mary could not have been either an 
angel or a monster. It is impossible that so gifted 



284 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

and gracious a character could have been guilty of 
all the crimes charged against her, or that such crim- 
inality, if actual, could have emanated from the 
sweet and tender woman that Mary Stuart undoubt- 
edly was. But suppose that she was a person easily 
influenced by good or evil; that with brilliant and 
beautiful qualities she had a conscience perverted 
by Romish teaching, and a love of intrigue developed 
at the gay and corrupt court of France; that with 
good intentions and a lofty ideal of duty, she was 
more readily moved by the subtle, seductive policy 
of her foreign advisers than toward the stern and 
warlike programme of the Scotch reformers. Now 
let such a pleasure loving and mercurial character be 
placed in the midst of the confusion and conflicts of 
a stormy time, and we can see how it could become 
a victim of the most diverse influences. Mary Stu- 
art owed her greatest mistakes to her fatal weakness 
of moral resolution. She was led into complicity 
with crime because of her wrongful dependence on 
evil counsel. This does not acquit her of all crim- 
inality, but it helps to explain the otherwise hopeless 
paradox of her character. She was neither as fair 
as her friends, nor as foul as her foes, have portrayed 
her. Midway between extremes, trying perhaps to 
satisfy the claims of both truth and error, she made 



JOHN KNOX 285 

the mistake and suffered the punishment of all who 
forget that in this world of moral antagonism no one 
can serve two masters. A choice must be made and 
the battle fought on one side or the other. Ye can- 
not serve God and mammon. Choose ye whom ye 
will serve. 

But what a contrast do we see when John Knox 
and Mary Queen of Scots met, as they often did. 
On arriving from the continent to take possession of 
her throne, the young and charming widow (whose 
French husband had recently died) came with smil- 
ing complacency to the crown which was to prove 
such an awful burden for her beautiful brow. But 
of the future she knew nothing. Attended by a 
retinue of gallant men and graceful women, such as 
only the splendid court of France could then furnish, 
with all the bravery of shining costumes and military 
display, — silks, satins, armor, banners and trumpets, 
the gay Queen thought that she was bringing sun- 
shine into the cold gloom of that northern land. She 
sincerely desired the good of Scotland, and naturally 
supposed that with processions and pomp, tourna- 
ment and luxury and the ceremonial glories of the 
ancient church of Rome, she could counteract the 
rigors of the Reformation, and lead the people into 
a better, brighter way. But she little knew the tem- 



286 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

per of the times, or the real character of her native 
land. 

Hardly had she been established with her glitter- 
ing court in the ancient home of her fathers, that 
picturesque castle which frowns over Edinboro the 
romantic town, when she was confronted with the 
Genius of Scotland in the person of its champion. 
And all history may be searched in vain to rival the 
picture of that meeting, when the elegant, affable, 
royal lady saw standing before her the thin, spare 
figure of the Protestant preacher. Clad in the grave 
severity of the Genevan cleric, with thin, set face 
and fiery eyes, and sharp, quick voice, firm and fear- 
less before the throne as he had been in the midst 
of armies and mobs, thus the modern Elijah stands. 

Queen Mary thinks that she can soften him as she 
has melted every other man whom she has ever met, 
but she soon discovers her mistake. All the shining 
splendors of the court, her own charm of face and 
manner, the music of her voice and the winsome wit 
of her address, are wasted on the shrewd and steady 
mind, the divinely inspired heart, and the firmly fixed 
will of John Knox. 

She pleads for more lenient treatment of the op- 
pressed Romanists. She suggests compromise. She 
advises a new policy. She even resorts to warnings 



JOHN KNOX 287 

and threats. Knox feels her power. As he said 
afterwards, it cost him more to resist the plaintive 
appeal of a beautiful woman than to brave the 
wrath of warriors and mobs. But he was equal to 
the emergency; and the Queen might as 
well have plead her cause with the North 
wind sweeping down from the Grampian 
Hills. The stern soldier of the Gospel 
has his arguments and objections and resolutions 
that will brook no opposition. He represents the 
power of Truth that has been set in motion by God 
himself and is on its way to the conquest of the 
world. What to him are the smiles of a graceful 
lady or the frown of an enthroned Queen? Even 
the tears which Mary Stuart knew so well how to 
shed and which, with the lace kerchief in her 
smooth white hand, had never yet failed of dramatic 
effect, (for who could withstand the plaintive grief 
of a broken-hearted woman?) — even all this is noth- 
\ng to the firm, inflexible spirit of the great Reformer. 
It is not a question of gallantry or of conventional 
usage with him, else he would have treated the lady 
with the deference due always from a gentleman. It 
is a matter of principle that he stands for, a great 
national issue of moral right and wrong. The beau- 
tiful Queen is in his eyes the representative and cham- 



288 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

pion of the false religion that has been the curse of 
Scotland for ages; and therefore she must be with- 
stood and opposed as Romanism must be extirpated, 
at least to the extent that she represents that cause. 
Thus the two great characters stood opposed to 
each other then, and thus they are standing still in 
history to this day. Time enough has elapsed for 
the fierce factional strife that raged around them 
then to subside; and now the world gazes on that 
strange contrast with calm and candid eyes. We 
can do justice to both of those antagonists. We see 
that John Knox was not altogether the sublime hero 
and that Mary was not wholly the false enchantress 
that so many have held them to be. He had his 
faults and she had her virtues. We can deplore and 
condemn the narrowness and hardness and fierceness 
of the Reformer's polemic spirit, while we honor the 
valor and wisdom of his great crusade. So we may 
admit and admire the many graceful qualities of 
that hapless lady whose fate it was to embody a lost 
cause and fall a victim to evil influences which she 
was blameworthy for yielding to. Yet it is not as Per- 
sons, but as Principles, that the two characters will 
abide in history. They represent that immemorial 
antagonism which has always divided the world 
between good and evil, light and darkness; and they 



JOHN KNOX 289 

show that in the large reach of time it is EH] ah that 
triumphs over all that Beauty, Art and Power can 
do in opposition. Religious error never found a 
finer and more attractive embodiment than in the per- 
son of Mary Stuart; and if she, with all the power of 
royalty at command, could not by her beauty, cul- 
ture and courage secure a final victory for Evil, who 
can? 

Romanism still lives and flourishes in the world, 
but not in Scotland, where the hard, grim protestant 
defeated it, nor anywhere else is it today the imperial 
dominance which once defied the heavens and the 
earth. For that false religion is only one of the 
many forms which Error has taken and is still wear- 
ing in the world. And is it not startling to observe 
how the ancient attraction still persists in throwing 
its charms over Sin! How often in this world of 
moral confusion do we see error in the guise of the 
Beautiful, the Graceful, the Fascinating, while Truth 
takes a form which is hard, stern, even repellent! 
It is the strange testimony of history that in the long 
embattled campaign by which the Reformation res- 
cued religion from the bondage of Mediaevalism, the 
Fine Arts were almost uniformly on the side of Ro- 
mish Error. Wiclif and Huss, Luther and Calvin, 
received no aid from the poetry and painting, the 



290 STUDIES IN BIOGRAPHY 

sculpture, architecture and music of their times. 
Those great forces were always on the side of the 
Established Church. This accounts for the other- 
wise mysterious fact that the Huguenots, Covenanters 
and Puritans were so determined in their opposition 
to all artistic embellishment of religion, and that they 
bequeathed to their descendants a prejudice against 
aesthetic Christianity which has continued almost to 
the present time. 

I need not show that we have largely outgrown 
this prejudice and that now the ministry of Art is 
found to be not incompatible with genuine spiritu- 
ality. Nevertheless, it seems as true in the present 
as in the past that error is more fond of sensuous at- 
tractions than is the Gospel of Christ. And we must 
be on our guard against those seductive influences 
which the god of this world is always able to use. 
The example of Christ and his apostles is on the side 
of self-denial and rigorous devotion to the right at 
any cost. It is as true now as then that moral duty 
requires difficult devotion and even strenuous con- 
flict. It is not, and never will be, in this world, an 
easy or pleasant thing to serve the Cross of Sacrifice. 
And especially in such an age of material prosperity 
as this, when luxury and indulgence are reveling in 
their wanton license everywhere, we need to culti- 



JOHN KNOX 291 

vale the hard virtues of John Knox rather than the 
soft charms of Queen Mary. The ancient warning 
should sound in our ears, "Love not the world, neith- 
er the things that are in the world. If any man love 
the world, the love of the Father is not in him." 

For while true beauty is of God, and the graces 
of artistic refinement may have a place in His ser- 
vice, still these elements are to be very cautiously 
favored, so perilous may they be. When the great 
battle is joined, which never ceases on earth, between 
titled Wrong and struggling Righteousness, between 
the sheen of glittering Error and the firm, frowning 
front of endangered Truth, then let us be found 
where brave soldiers should be. For all that is of 
the world, the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, 
and the pride of life, is not of the Father. The 
world passeth away, and the lust thereof; but he 
that doeth the will of God abideth forever. 




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